(15 Apr 2024)
LEBANON SYRIAN REFUGEES
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
LENGTH: 1:27
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Beirut, Lebanon – 15 April 2024
1. Meeting
2. Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati meeting with caretaker ministers
3. Mikati during meeting
4. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ziad Makary, Lebanese Caretaker Minister of Information:
"When it comes to the presence of the Syrians, the attendees discussed ways to differentiate between those displaced and those who are not, those who are here legally and those here illegally. It was recommended to implement the Lebanese laws on all without taking into consideration the current job of the displaced person, and to instruct mayors to close all violating institutions."
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Arsal, Lebanon – 26 October 2022
5. Various of Syrian refugees gathering to register their names
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Beirut, Lebanon – 15 April 2024
6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ziad Makary, Lebanese Caretaker Minister of Information:
"We discussed the possibility of resolving the overcrowding of prisons and the possibility of deporting Syrians from them as per Lebanese laws and regulations, in addition to asserting the need to implement all decisions and circulars from the Interior Ministry and municipalities that are related to displaced Syrians."
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ARCHIVE: Arsal, Lebanon – 26 October 2022
7. Various of Syrian refugees with their belongings in trucks heading back to Syria
STORYLINE:
A Lebanese minister said on Monday the government has discussed the possibility of deporting Syrians as Lebanon’s prisons face overcrowding.
"We discussed the possibility of resolving the overcrowding of prisons and the possibility of deporting Syrians from them as per Lebanese laws and regulations," said caretaker Minister of Information Ziad Makary.
The caretaker government’s meeting comes as Lebanese officials have decried surging crime and unemployment which they say has been a result of hosting Syrian refugees in the tiny Mediterranean country.
Lebanon — which has been coping with a crippling economic crisis since 2019 — hosts some 805,000 UN-registered Syrian refugees, of which 90% live in poverty, the UN’s refugee agency says.
Lebanese officials estimate the actual number is far higher, ranging between 1.5 and 2 million.
Many have escaped the civil war in their country which has entered its 14th year.
The U.N. refugee agency also noted the surge in migrant departures from Lebanon and confirmed that most were Syrian refugees.
Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Cypriot president Nikos Christodoulides last Monday called for a European Union deal to curb migration from cash-strapped countries to European shores.
Mikati said that the Lebanese military and security agencies have been doing their utmost to curb migration, but both delegations agreed the magnitude of the situation needed a framework agreement with the EU.
He was referring to migration-linked European financial packages with fellow cash-strapped Mediterranean countries Tunisia and Egypt.
Cyprus said Saturday it’s suspending processing all asylum applications by Syrian nationals because large numbers of refugees from the war-torn country continue to reach the island nation by boat, primarily from Lebanon.
In a written statement, the Cypriot government said the suspension is also partly because of ongoing efforts to get the European Union to redesignate some areas of the war-torn country as safe zones to enable repatriations.
AP video shot by Fadi Tawil
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