Summary
Interior Minister Raya El Hassan and other officials hit back at Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil over the weekend after he called on municipalities to contribute to the return of refugees. Hassan said Sunday that the role of municipalities and other measures related to the Syrian refugee crisis were determined by Cabinet, which was the suitable place for discussions to solve the crisis.
Bassil has repeatedly called on the international community to help in returning refugees to their homeland without waiting for a political solution to the yearslong conflict in Syria.
General Security head Abbas Ibrahim said Saturday that the safe return of refugees awaited a "big political decision" that was not yet present in Lebanon, which was why the agency had been facilitating their voluntary return.
This has made possible the return of tens of thousands of refugees since last summer.
Bassil also claimed Saturday that births among Syrian refugees exceeded those of the Lebanese and that weapons were found "in the smallest of [refugee] camps".
Later Saturday, General Security released a statement accusing some organizations and forums of increasing their activity on the Syrian refugee issue and turning it into a political subject.
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