LEBANESE protesters obstructed major highways with burning tyres and roadblocks today, saying they will remain in the streets despite President Michel Aoun’s appeal for them to go home.

A man was killed by a soldier during demonstrations on Tuesday night, marking the first such fatality since nationwide unrest engulfed Lebanon on October 17.

Protesters took to the streets after Mr Aoun said in a televised interview that there could be further delays before a new government is formed.

The demonstrators are demanding an end to the rule of the political elite that has run the country since the end of the 1975-90 civil war.

Motorways linking Beirut with southern and northern Lebanon were closed, as were other roads in major cities and towns. 

In Nahr al-Kalb north of Beirut, protesters closed a tunnel by parking their cars inside it, while a nearby highway was filled with debris. 

In Khaldeh, at Beirut’s southern entrance, tyres were set on fire and sand barriers blocked a vital highway.

The place in the Khaldeh area where the first fatality of the protests, Alaa Abou Fakher, was shot was decorated with roses and a Lebanese flag was placed nearby. 

He was the first person killed in direct shooting related to the protests, though there have been four other deaths since the demonstrations began.