SYRIAN REFUGEES POSE SERIOUS THREAT TO LEBANON STABILITY

Beirut, 28 Jumadil Awwal 1435/29 March 2014 (MINA) – The United Nations has warned that the influx of Syrian refugees into Lebanon poses a serious threat to the country’s stability and the region.

“There is not a single country in the world today that is shouldering as much in proportion to its size as Lebanon,” Ninette Kelley, regional representative for Lebanon for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said on Friday.

Kelley said the influx of one million Syrian refugees into neighboring Lebanon has pushed up the country’s population by one-fourth, Press TV quoted by Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA) as reporting.

This inflicts a major strain on Lebanon’s public infrastructure as people fleeing violence in Syria seek housing, food, and healthcare at a time of economic slowdown in the country.

The UN official described the influx as a threat to the country’s economy and warned that it would also make a spillover of the conflict in Syria into Lebanon more likely.

Kelley made comments on his visit to Washington and a week after Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil said the crisis in Syria is threatening the existence of Lebanon, which has gone through a year-long political crisis.

Over the past years, millions of Syrians have fled the war and sought refuge in neighboring countries.

According to the UN, hundreds of thousands of Syrians have fled to Jordan, Turkey while Lebanon bears the largest concentration of Syrian refugees, close to 1 million people.

Syria has been gripped by deadly violence since 2011. Reports say some 140,000 people have so far been killed and millions of others displaced because of the foreign-backed crisis. (T/E01/IR)

Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)