The Prime Minister met a family who are due to be flown to the UK, following his announcement last week that Britain will accept up to 20,000 Syrian refugees over the next five years.
Amid tight security, the British prime minister travelled by Chinook helicopter from Beirut airport to a UNHCR camp in the Bekaa Valley, less than a mile from the Syrian border, to call for the EU to focus its attention on helping refugees in the region.
Cameron said: “I wanted to come here to see for myself and to hear for myself.”
The prime minister said in Lebanon that £1bn in British aid provided to the region since 2012 has helped to ensure that just 3% of Syria’s 11m refugees have sought asylum in Europe.
Cameron announced that he is appointing Richard Harrington as minister for Syrian refugees to ensure the arrivals are given a “warm welcome” in the UK.
Lebanon, which has population of 4 million, is hosting 1.1 million Syrian refugees in internal tented settlements. These contrast with formal refugee camps, which host 450,000 Palestinian refugees.
At the Bekaa Valley camp, 500 people, including many children, are crowded into 90 tents, which are laid out in ranks behind a breeze-block wall. The prime minister later travelled back to Beirut to visit a school where Syrian refugee children are being educated alongside Lebanese children.
Author
