90% Syrian refugees in Lebanon need humanitarian aid: UN agencies

By Wassim Seif El Din

BEIRUT (AA) - A group of UN agencies on Friday said that 90% of the Syrian refugees in Lebanon are in need of humanitarian assistance.

Most of the Syrian refugees suffer from tough living conditions, especially with the exacerbation of the Lebanese economic crisis on one hand and the global economic crisis on the other.

"90% of Syrian refugee families need humanitarian assistance to survive," said a joint statement by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the World Food Program (WFP) and the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).

"The levels of food security for refugees in Lebanon are extremely worrisome,” said Abdallah AlWardat, WFP representative and country director in Lebanon.

"Thanks to the generous support of our donors, WFP is supporting 1 in every 3 people in the country. We are providing cash assistance, food parcels and school snacks, and supporting livelihoods activities across Lebanon," he added.

Ayaki Ito, the UNHCR representative in Lebanon, said despite the fact that since 2020 the "price of essential items and services" have increased by 700%, yet, "families in Lebanon still earn less while having to pay much more for the most basic goods."

“Syrian refugee children and adolescents are affected the most. The assessment showed that 60 per cent of Syrian refugee children between the ages of 6 and 14 were attending school regularly in 2022, with the rate dropping to 8 per cent attendance for the older adolescents at upper secondary school level," the joint statement said.

It added that children and adolescents are the most affected among the Syrian refugees in Lebanon with estimates indicating that "six out of 10 Syrian refugee boys and girls experienced violent disciplinary methods."

Lebanon hosts around 1.5 million Syrian refugees, about 900,000 of whom are registered with UNHCR.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar