Report: U.S. to Dedicate 500 Million Dollars to Lebanon at Kuwait Conference

The United States is expected to grant Lebanon USD 500 million to Lebanon through its United States Agency for International Development (USAID), reported the daily An Nahar on Sunday.

It is supposed to make the announcement at the Kuwait donors conference scheduled for Monday.

Social Affairs Minister Rashid Derbas had stated earlier in March that Lebanon will ask the international community for 2.1 billion dollars in assistance at the conference.

Lebanon aims to urge the assistance to help it resolve problems linked to the displaced Syrians on the course of two years, he added.

Media reports said that 37 percent of the assistance that Lebanon will ask for will be allocated for government spending and the remaining 63 percent will cover humanitarian cases such as aid to Lebanon's most vulnerable communities and the refugees.

Prime Minister Tammam Salam will head the Lebanese delegation to the conference.

The Gulf state has hosted previous such conferences in the past two years which saw pledges of around $4 billion in aid, including $800 million from Kuwait.

But U.N. humanitarian agencies have complained that many donors have not followed through on pledges, forcing them to cut assistance to millions of Syrians.

There are more than 1.5 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon. Well over half of them are living in insecure dwellings – up from a third last year. The country has struggled to cope with their burden since the eruption of the Syrian conflict in March 2011.

M.T.