Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati has called for Syrian refugees in his country to return home after the dramatic downfall last week of Bashar al-Assad.
Speaking at the Brothers of Italy’s annual Artreju Festival in Rome, Mikati said a third of the population of 5.8 million is made up people who fled Syria, making Lebanon home to the largest number of refugees per capita.
“The strain on our resources has been substantial, worsening existing economic trouble and creating fierce competition for jobs and services,” he said.
“Today, and after the political transformation in Syria, the best resolution to this issue is for Syrians to go back to their homeland.”
Authorities in Lebanon say the country hosts around two million Syrians, while more than 800,000 are registered with the United Nations.
Many fled Syria after the civil war began following the brutal crackdown on anti-government protests which were part of the Arab Spring in 2011.
Mikati’s comments come as countries across Europe have begun deliberating what to do with their Syrian refugee populations.
Several countries, including Belgium, Denmark, Germany and the Czech Republic, have stopped processing asylum applications filed by Syrians.
But they all agree it is too early to consider returning refugees to Syria.
The European Commission said that currently “the conditions are not met for safe, voluntary, dignified returns to Syria.”
“We need to wait a few more days to see where Syria is heading now,” German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said.
“What is the situation? What about the protection of minorities? What about the protection of the people? And then, of course, there could be repatriation.”
Earlier this week, Austria’s government has said it was offering Syrian refugees in the country a ‘return bonus’ of €1,000 euros to go back to Syria.
“The country now needs its citizens in order to be rebuilt,” Conservative Chancellor Karl Nehammer said in a statement posted in English and German on X.
Nehammer’s comments come in the same week that Jens Spahn, the former Health Minister under Chancellor Angela Merkel, pitched a similar idea in a TV interview.
“What if the German government said: ‘We will charter planes for anyone who wants to go back to Syria, and we will give them €1,000 to get them started’?” he asked.
The arrival in Europe in 2015 of well over one million refugees, most of them fleeing the civil war in Syria, sparked one of the EU’s biggest political crises as nations bickered over who should host them and whether other countries should be forced to help. Those tensions remain even today.
Almost 14,000 Syrians applied for international protection in Europe this year up to September, according to the EU’s asylum agency.
Around 183,000 Syrians applied for asylum in all of last year. On average, around one in three applications are accepted.
The UN’s refugee agency has called for “patience and vigilance” in the treatment of Syrians who have sought international protection and believes that much will depend on whether Syria’s new leaders are prepared to respect law and order.
