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Beirut – November9th, 2019
Position Statement
With the demonstrations in Lebanon entering their third week, Lebanese people showed in their slogans and chants during protests a significant awareness of the fact that Syrian refugees’ file is nothing but a scapegoat used by some anti-refugees political forces to blame their reluctance and make pressureon the international community about the situation of refugees as one of the reasons of the government’s inefficiency and numerous crisis in Lebanon.
Since Access Center for Human Rights (ACHR) is directly concerned with following refugee’s issues in Lebanon, the team has monitored officials’ statements and demonstrations with great caution, witnessing some areas in Lebanon advocating for refugees in their chanted slogans and others not even addressing them, while they have been targeted by some politicians in their statements. Whereby we express our concern about Syrian refugees being accused in same of these official statements addressed to the Lebanese people.
It is clear that the reasons for the widespread popular protests were economic grievance, oppression of freedoms, political forces evading the application of the law as well as accountability of officials, failing over the years to follow corruption files seriously. Protests are demanding to change the regime calling for political forces to abide by the principles of human rights, respect the legitimate demands of Lebanese public opinion in the streets, and leave the new government formation to the public who previously gave legitimacy to current officials.
Therefore, (ACHR) demands Lebanese authorities and political forces to dissociate the Syrian refugees’ file from the political scene refraining to drag them in the popular movements and to claim Syrian refugees’ issues as a reason of the government’s inefficiency in saving the Lebanese people.