اشترِك في نشرتنا الإخبارية
BEIRUT: Prime Minister Tammam Salam appealed Monday to Arab countries to provide financial aid to Lebanon and to facilitate the return of Syrian refugees to their home country.
Speaking at the Arab League Summit chaired by Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, Salam proposed the formation of an Arab joint committee that will be tasked with coordinating with the international community to establish zones within Syria to host refugees.
"Providing support to Syrians in their land would be less costly for neighboring and donor countries and is the best way to stop the crime of displacing Syrians," Salam told participants at the summit.
Until such zones could be established, Salam suggested the establishment of an Arab fund to support host countries cope with the burden of refugees and improve their living conditions, arguing that Lebanon could not alone shoulder this responsibility.
Since Syria's conflict began in March 2011, hundreds of thousands of Syrians have fled to Lebanon, which is now home to some 1.5 million refugees.
"We are a small country assuming its duty toward its brothers though international aid has fallen short of the needs of refugees and host communities," Salam said.
Salam and Lebanese officials were criticized by journalists and on social media upon their arrival to Mauritania after Lebanese Health Minister Wael Abu Faour questioned the impoverished African nation's ability to host top delegations.
"They don't have the infrastructure and it's miserable," said Abu Faour. "The summit will be held inside a tent," he added, apparently comparing it to previous summits that were held in five-star hotels or luxury conference centers.
The minister later clarified on TV that his statements were not meant against the people of Mauritania and said he got his information from a Lebanese delegation that went to inspect where the summit will be held and where the official delegations will be staying.
He told the local Al-Jadeed TV that the Lebanese delegation will fly to Morocco and spend the night there, then fly to attend the summit, leaving the same day without sleeping in Nouakchott.
The Arab League Summit chaired by Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz opened inside a large tent in Nouakchott.
But Abu Faour's statements angered Lebanese living in Mauritania who poked fun at their government and politicians, citing a months-long trash crisis that hit Lebanon over that past year and led to piles of uncollected trash building up in Beirut and its suburbs.
Prominent Palestinian journalist Abdul-Bari Atwan criticized Lebanese politicians in a column he wrote in his online Rai Al-Youm newspaper.
"We don't understand the arrogance by leaders who claim they are Arabs, toward a country like Mauritania whose only guilt is that it is a poor country that does not have oil or gold," Atwan wrote.
Mauritanian journalist Naji Mohammed al-Imam wrote in the daily Al-Wahdawi that Abu Faour "lives amid mountains of trash" and described Salam as a prime minister "by coincidence."--with AP
