Director of UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) affairs in Lebanon Matthias Schmale called on the European Union on Friday 9 September to offer financial support and also to bring its influence to bear. He urged, too, that Palestinian refugees should not be forgotten.
Some 65% of the 270,000 Palestinian refugees who use UNRWA services live below the poverty line. Half of these refugees live in overcrowded camps, described by Schmale as “ghettos”, where electric cables lie everywhere resulting in electrocutions and where problems of security are rife. Since the start of the war in Syria, these have been joined by 40,000 more Palestinian refugees, who had been living in Syria (10,000 of whom have since left the country).
“We are calling not just for financial support but also for support in terms of influence since the EU is an important partner of the government of Lebanon”, said Schmale in a meeting in Brussels with EUROPE and the Kuwaiti press agency Kuna. While highlighting the huge weight that Lebanon has to bear, with over 1.5 million refugees, Schmale called on the country to adopt a more flexible attitude towards these refugees. “In an appropriate manner, we need to challenge authorities to do more about opening up job opportunities, issuing proper travel documents for those who want to leave and about the right to property”, he said. Palestinian refugees are only allowed to engage in 36 professions. Schmale added that it is difficult to obtain a work permit and social protection. He said that integration of the refugees was a very sensitive issue for the Lebanese and that it was not integration that UNRWA was asking for but more opportunities for the refugees.
Thanking the European Union for its financial support for his organisation, including for its work in Lebanon – €46 million for projects, a contribution of €44 million for urgent needs over the period from 2007 to 2015 and aid for the Syrian Palestinian refugees of around €2.7 million – Schmale nonetheless urged the EU to do something more and push the other members of the United Nations to follow its example. “The EU is the second highest UNRWA donor but there is always a need for more money”, he stated. He pointed out that this year’s budget, just like last year’s, is overspent. “We are asking for more for the core budget to safeguard the stability of our key services”, such as health, education and the upgrading of the camps, he added. On 8 September, UNRWA Commissioner General Pierre Krähenbühl announced that there was a shortfall of $96.5 million (€86 million) in the budget. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)