Free Patriotic Movement chief and Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil on Sunday stressed that the FPM will not tolerate the creation of Syrian refugee camps in Lebanon.
“We will not tolerate today what we had resisted in 2011, which is the creation of Syrian refugee camps,” Bassil emphasized during a tour of the Western Bekaa region.
“Syrian citizens have only one route, which is the route that leads to their homeland,” Bassil underlined.
He added, “Yes, we are racist Lebanese and at the same time we are open to the world and no one has the right to lecture us about being humanitarian.”
More than one million Syrian refugees have flooded into Lebanon since the conflict in their own country erupted in March 2011.
They live in homes and informal camps, and their presence has been largely tolerated, despite testing the limited resources and aging infrastructure available to Lebanon's citizens.
In recent months, there have been rising calls to repatriate the refugees but also warnings against racist rhetoric.
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This article has been adapted from its original source.
