Suleiman Asks Qahwaji to Deliver FM Reports on Syrian Raids, Calls for Establishing Refugee Camps inside Syria
President Michel Suleiman asked the army chief on Thursday to deliver the ministry of foreign affairs copies of security reports on the latest Syrian airstrikes on the outskirts of the northeastern town of Arsal.
A statement issued by the presidential palace said Army chief Gen. Jean Qahwaji visited Suleiman who asked him to hand the ministry the copies of the raids in Arsal on Wednesday and another attack that took place on March 18.
Wednesday's raid involved two rocket attacks on a house 11 kilometers deep into Lebanese territories and the previous one included assaults as deep as 5 kilometers across the border with Syria.
Mortars and shells from the Syrian side regularly crash in Lebanon and troops loyal to President Bashar Assad have on several occasions launched raids inside Lebanese territories bordering Syria.
Suleiman also met the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Peter Maurer, and reiterated his calls for holding an international conference to discuss the situation of Syrian refugees in Lebanon.
“We call for establishing U.N.-protected refugee camps inside Syria and for redistributing Syrians in Lebanon to neighboring countries,” the president said in a released statement after his talks with Maurer.
He elaborated: “We suggest that the camps be inside Syrian territories, away from conflict zones, and be close to areas bordering Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq”.
"Syrians taking refuge in Lebanon in the future could also be distributed to neighboring and friendly countries,” Suleiman added.
A source in the presidency expressed to Agence France Presse on Thursday: “"Lebanon cannot support the number of refugees present within its territories”.
The comments come as Lebanon struggles under the weight of a wave of Syrian refugees from all walks of life who have flooded across the border as the conflict in their country continues into a third year.
The United Nations refugee agency UNHCR has registered more than 400,000 Syrian refugees in Lebanon, though many more are believed to be in the country.
Lebanese officials have frequently said that the country of just four million residents is ill-equipped to handle the number of refugees it is currently seeing.
More than a million Syrians have sought refuge outside their country since the uprising against the regime of President Bashar Assad began in March 2011, with another four million believed to be internally displaced.
| Copyright © 2012 Naharnet.com. All Rights Reserved. | https://cdn.naharnet.com/stories/en/78233 |