Lebanon's new government should take all necessary measures to strengthen judicial independence and ensure that the investigation into the August 2020 Beirut port explosion can proceed without undue interference or obstruction, survivors and families of Beirut port blast and 18 rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, said today. The groups and individuals sent a joint letter to Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Justice Minister Adel Nassar.
"Public statements by Lebanon's prime minister and justice minister in support of the investigation into the Beirut blast are encouraging signs after years of repeated obstruction by Lebanese authorities," said Ramzi Kaiss, Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch. "But the government should now turn these commitments into action by working with parliament to remove the legal and political barriers that have crippled the investigation and blocked justice and accountability."
In early February 2025, Lebanese investigative judge, Tarek Bitar, resumed his investigation into the Beirut port blast case after two years of obstruction and interference by Lebanese authorities. In January 2023, an earlier attempt by Bitar to resume the investigation was thwarted by Lebanon's top prosecutor at the time, Ghassan Oueidat, who filed a lawsuit against Bitar, suspending the investigation. He also ordered the release of all suspects, and barred security forces and the public prosecution office from collaborating with or receiving any communication from Judge Bitar.
In March, Lebanon's interim public prosecutor, Jamal Hajjar, annulled Oueidat's decision, enabling Bitar to work with Lebanon's security agencies and Public Prosecution Office to issue investigation summonses or arrest warrants. The cooperation of Lebanon's Public Prosecution Office and security services with Judge Bitar will be vitally important to secure justice, truth, and reparations for the victims of the Beirut port explosion, the organizations, survivors, and families of victims said in their letter.
A Human Rights Watch investigation found that the August 4, 2020 Beirut port explosion, one of the largest nonnuclear explosions in history, arose from the government's failure to protect the right to life and indicated the potential involvement of senior officials in Lebanon. Lebanese authorities have repeatedly obstructed the domestic investigation into the explosion by shielding politicians and officials implicated in the explosion from questioning, prosecution, and arrest.
Signatories to the joint letter stressed that the investigation into the blast should go beyond the circumstances around the warehousing of the ammonium nitrate in Lebanon and include a comprehensive examination of the involvement of all individuals and entities across the entire chain of events leading to the blast. They said that the investigation should identify any human rights violations arising from the Lebanese state's failure to protect the right to life, including with respect to any politically sensitive murders that appear to have been connected to the explosion.
Without much-needed reforms, the independence of the investigation, in addition to the independence of the judiciary more generally, remains at risk, the signatories said. For years, Lebanese and international rights groups have documented repeated political interference with the judiciary, in addition to flawed investigations of politically sensitive murders, and criticized the lack of an independent judiciary, which has allowed a culture of impunity to flourish.
A 2018 Draft Law on the Independence and Transparency of the Judiciary and a 2020 Draft Law on the Administrative Judiciary are currently under parliamentary committee review. Lebanese rights groups have criticized attempts by both the Administration and Justice Parliamentary Committee and the former Minister of Justice to amend the bills in a manner that contravenes international standards. The European Commission for Democracy Through Law (Venice Commission) has adopted two separate opinions on both the Draft Law on Independence and Transparency of the Judiciary and the Draft Law on the Administrative Judiciary, providing the Lebanese government and parliament with recommendations intended to bring them in line with international standards.
In March 2023, nine members of Lebanon's parliament introduced two draft laws that would strengthen the independence of judicial investigations and prevent political interference by amending article 751 of Lebanon's Code of Civil Procedure and article 52 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Both have been used to paralyze the investigation into the port explosion and other investigations into financial crimes and allegations of fraud.
Lebanon's government should work with parliament toward adopting draft laws on judicial independence that reflect the Venice Commission's recommendations and other international standards on judicial independence. They should also adopt critical amendments to Lebanon's civil and criminal procedures codes to reform provisions that have been exploited to obstruct criminal and civil investigations, the organizations said.
"It's better late than never for Lebanon's government to stand by victims, survivors, and the people of Beirut," Kaiss said. "But breaking from decades of impunity requires concrete, critical steps to bolster judicial independence as a top priority."
