Crisis-hit Lebanon no longer has the ability to host Syrian refugees without assistance, Labour Minister Mustafa Bayram said.
“Lebanon can no longer bear this burden on its own, without any assistance,” Bayram was quoted as saying by the National News Agency while urging the UN to shoulder its responsibility.
Following a meeting of the ministerial committee on Syrian refugees, Bayram noted that Syrian refugees can receive cash assistance from the UN, as well as support for education, rent, hospitalisation, and heating, while Lebanese citizens have to pay for these services from their pockets without any form of assistance which is unfair for the locals, reports Xinhua news agency.
“The situation has become unbearable,” Bayram said.
Minister of Social Affairs Hector Hajjar said that he will brief the UN High Commissioner for Refugees on the ministerial committee’s decisions.
Nearly 11 years since the revolution in Syria began and violence escalated, around 1.5 million refugees remain displaced in Lebanon accounting for nearly a quarter of Lebanon’s total population, the highest proportion of refugees anywhere in the world.