4 Lebanese MPs resign amid anger over Beirut port blast

BEIRUT, Lebanon

Four Lebanese lawmakers have resigned amid growing public anger following a massive explosion that struck the Lebanon port earlier this week.

Three lawmakers belonging to the Lebanese Kataeb Party and an independent MP said they were resigning from the 128-member parliament.

“We and some other honorable MPs will strip the [political] elite of their cover,” MP Nadeem Gemayel said after his resignation.

Speaking during the funeral procession for Kataeb Party's Secretary-General Nizar Najarian, Gemayel said the Beirut explosion will “usher in the birth of a new Lebanon”.

The party has only three seats in the Lebanese parliament.

Meanwhile, female lawmaker Paula Yacoubian also announced her resignation, calling on other Lebanese lawmakers to follow suit.

“Opposition from within is no longer useful,” she said on Twitter.

Earlier this week, MP Marwan Hamadeh from the Lebanese Democratic Gathering resigned from the assembly in protest of the Beirut port explosion.

At least 154 people were killed and nearly 7,000 injured in Tuesday’s blast that caused massive material damage to several neighborhoods in the Lebanese capital.

Lebanese officials said the blast was caused by the detonation of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate that had been stored unsafely at the port for the last six years.

The government has announced the formation of an investigation committee to probe the incident, which happened as Lebanon was reeling under its worst economic crisis.

* Ahmed Asmar contributed to this report from Ankara