Director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon Claudio Cordone assured on Friday that the issuance of work permits for Palestinians in Lebanon will not impact UNRWA's support for refugees.
Cordone was speaking following a meeting with Lebanese Labor Minister Camille Abu Suleiman.
Lebanese authorities have recently pledged to ease Palestinians’ ability to obtain work permits in line with Lebanese law.
During his meeting with Cordone, Abu Suleiman called on the international community to increase its support for UNRWA to enable the agency to support Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and ease their difficulties.
He reiterated his ministry's willingness to offer all the needed support for Palestinians to work without any violations of the Lebanese labor law.
On Thursday, Abu Suleiman revealed during a visit to Prime Minister Saad Hariri that he would hold a meeting next week with ministry staff and Palestinian officials to hear their concerns and work on simplifying the procedures as much as possible within the framework of Lebanese law.
On Friday, the Labor Minister also visited Speaker Nabih Berri at his Ain el-Tineh residence to discuss ways to ease the process for Palestinians to obtain work permits.
In line with its “Combating illegal foreign workers” campaign, last month the Labor Ministry gave business owners a one-month deadline to settle the paperwork of their foreign staff, and started to address violations in recent weeks.
The campaign has seen inspectors from the Ministry closing down and issuing fines to any institution that employs foreign workers with no legal permits.
Meanwhile, Palestinian refugees in El-Buss camp went on strike and closed their shops on Friday.
A similar strike was observed in Al-Baddawi camp where refugees shut down institutions that belong to UNRWA.
