Gunman takes hostages at Beirut bank to try to free his trapped savings

Gunman takes hostages at Beirut bank to try to free his trapped savings

A Lebanese man armed with a shotgun has taken hostages at a Beirut bank and threatened to set himself on fire unless he receives his trapped savings, a security official has said.

The man, identified as 42-year-old Bassam al-Sheikh Hussein, entered a branch of the Federal Bank in Beirut’s bustling Hamra district carrying a canister of petrol and the gun and took six or seven bank employees hostage, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

George al-Haj, the head of the bank employees’ syndicate, told local media that seven or eight bank employees and two customers were being held hostage.