Miqati Meets Ban: Lebanon to Facilitate Passage of Humanitarian Aid to Syria
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati expressed Lebanon's readiness to facilitate the passage of any humanitarian aid to the neighboring country Syria, hoping that the international community would continue supporting Lebanon to confront the refugee crisis.
Miqati called on the international community to support Lebanon through practical measures to help it confront its economic woos and the humanitarian challenges caused by the large influx of Syrian refugees.
He lamented during talks with U.N. secretary-general Ban Ki-moon in New York that Lebanon can't bear alone the burdens imposed by the refugee crisis.
Miqati voiced hope that the International Support Group for Lebanon would continue its meetings and aid Lebabon.
World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim warned recently that Lebanon is heading towards a “disaster” over the alarming influx of Syrian refugees into its territories.
For his part, the U.N. chief noted “the importance of continued united international support, including the critical need to assist Lebanon in meeting immediate and longer-term requirements resulting from the growing presence of refugees from Syria.”
Ban stressed the importance “that the United Nations attaches to preserving Lebanon’s stability and security, including through the policy of disassociation, as well as preventing a return to impunity in Lebanon.”
The meeting was held in presence of Lebanon's ambassador to the United Nations Nawaf Salam.
caretaker Minister of Social Affairs Wael Abou Faour said from Geneva that Lebanon counted by Monday evening some 769,000 Syrians registered or in the process of registering as refugees, pointing out that on Monday morning the number had been 763,000.
Including all the unregistered Syrians, the actual number is around 1.3 million, he said, or about 30 percent of the Lebanese population.
Monday's Geneva conference will form three committees to resolve the Syrian refugee crisis – one that deals with finances, the other works on sending them to other countries and the third to find refuge to them inside Syria.
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