Residents of Cracked Tripoli Building Quarrel with ISF, Demand Compensations
The residents of a building feared that it would collapse in the northern city of Tripoli squabbled on Saturday with Internal Security Forces members after preventing them from entering their apartments.
The residents of “Karim” building which is located in Abi Samra district and was evacuated last week after cracks began appearing in its walls and foundations, tried to storm into the building prompting ISF to prevent them for their own safety.
The residents later held a sit-in outside the building, holding banners that call for holding those who are responsible accountable.
They also demanded compensations for being evacuated.
Last week, Higher Relief Council acting chief General Mohammed Kheir inspected the residential building.
He stressed after a meeting with the families that the HRC will provide the residents of the seven-storey building with temporary accommodation.
The official said that the municipality of Tripoli, the owner of the building and the engineers will be held responsible for the incident if investigations showed that the building was inhabitable.
Tripoli's Municipal chief Nader Ghazal had said that the municipality warned on several occasions the owner that the building cannot sustain an addition of two more stories.
But he didn't react positively to the warning and went ahead with the construction, prompting Ghazal to order the evacuation “to save the lives of seven families.”
Lebanon and mainly Tripoli are rife with building violations and locals often clash with security forces seeking to terminate illegal construction.
Several buildings have collapsed in different parts of Lebanon in the past few years, the worst of which was in January 2012 when a six-story residential building came crushing down in Beirut's Ashrafiyeh district, leaving scores of casualties.
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