Summary The "You Stink" activist campaign said police were using force against protesters inside
BEIRUT (AFP) - Lebanese police began forcibly removing protesters who occupied part of the environment ministry on Tuesday, a security source said, with activists claiming security forces were beating demonstrators.
"The police began evacuating the protesters who occupied the ministry," the source said, adding that police were gradually moving the demonstrators down from the seventh floor of the building.
The "You Stink" activist campaign said police were using force against protesters inside.
"(Activist) Lucien Bourjeily and a group of people participating in the sit-in were beaten and cannot be reached," the campaign said on its Facebook page.
A Red Cross official confirmed that medics had treated demonstrators with light wounds.
The official said 14 people were treated at the scene for wounds sustained in confrontations with police, with a fifteenth treated for respiratory problems.
Bourjeily was taken to hospital for treatment, the official said.
An interior ministry source told AFP around 14 demonstrators were still inside the building and were refusing to leave, insisting police would have to handcuff and remove them by force.
Outside the ministry, in downtown Beirut, several hundred protesters waved Lebanese flags and chanted in support of the activists inside as night fell.
The "You Stink" campaign began in response to a crisis that erupted with the closure of Lebanon s largest landfill in mid-July.
But it has evolved into an outlet for deep-seated frustrations over Lebanon s crumbling infrastructure and stagnant, confessional political system.
