BEIRUT (AP) — The European Union announced on Thursday an aid package for Lebanon of 1 billion euros — about $1.06 billion — that will mostly go to strengthening border control to halt the flow of asylum seekers and migrants from the small, crisis-wracked country across the Mediterranean Sea to Cyprus and Italy.
The deal follows other recent deals by the EU to provide funds to countries such as Egypt, Tunisia and Mauritania to fortify their borders. It comes against a backdrop of increasing hostility toward Syrian refugees in Lebanon and a major surge in irregular migration of Syrian refugees from Lebanon to Cyprus.
European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the aid, which will be distributed between this year and 2027, during a visit to Beirut alongside Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides.
Von der Leyen said the EU will also be “exploring how to work on a more structured approach to voluntary return to Syria in close cooperation with” the U.N. refugee agency, or UNHCR, and called for more international support for humanitarian and early recovery projects in Syria.