BEIRUT (AFP) — Lebanese judge Tarek Bitar resumed his investigation into the deadly 2020 Beirut port blast on Thursday, charging 10 people including security, customs, and military personnel, a judicial official said.

The fresh charges come after a two-year hiatus in the investigation into the August 4, 2020 explosion that killed more than 220 people, injured thousands, and devastated swathes of Lebanon’s capital.

Authorities said the explosion was triggered by a fire in a warehouse where a huge stockpile of ammonium nitrate fertilizer had been haphazardly stored for years.

But nobody has been held responsible for the blast, one of history’s largest non-nuclear explosions.

The probe stalled two years ago after Lebanese terror group Hezbollah had accused Bitar of bias and demanded his dismissal, and after officials named in the investigation had filed a flurry of lawsuits to prevent it from going forward.

The resumption comes with Hezbollah’s influence weakened after its recent war with Israel.

It also follows the election of a Lebanese president after the top position had been vacant for more than two years, with the new head of state Joseph Aoun last week pledging to work toward the “independence of the judiciary.”

The judicial official told AFP that “procedures in the case have resumed,” speaking on condition of anonymity to........

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