26 inmates escape from Lebanon jail

Beirut, Dec 20 Twenty-six prisoners escaped from a Lebanese jail, with eight of them rearrested later, local media reported.

Most of the escapees from Jib Jenin prison in the western Bekaa region were held on charges of trafficking drugs and weapons, Xinhua news agency quoted the local media report as saying.

The prisoners escaped through a ventilation opening, before the security forces captured one of the escapees on Monday morning and seven more in the afternoon, the L'Orient Today news website reported.

The past months have witnessed a spate of prison escapes in Lebanon when the value of law enforcement officers' salaries have been dramatically eroded by the depreciation of the national currency amid steep economic crisis, which has plunged about 80 per cent of the population into poverty.

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