The Coalition: Returning Syrian refugees under duress means returning them to the regime's slaughterhouses

ARK News… The Syrian National Coalition called on the Lebanese authorities to avoid the mechanisms of abuse and coercion with the Syrian refugees who risk their lives in order to reach Europe by not handing them over to the Assad regime, from whose oppression they fled.

The Coordinator of the Refugee Affairs Department in the Coalition, "Salim Idris", said that the process of cutting the borders towards Syria from Lebanon is undoubtedly easier than crossing the seas and fees to reach Europe, but the lack of hope in Syria pushes the Syrian refugee in Lebanon to risk his life and cross the seas, provided that he does not return to areas controlled by the Assad regime, pointing out that forcibly returning these people to the country from which they fled means returning them to the "regime's slaughterhouses."

The Associated Press reported in a report that the Lebanese authorities detained dozens of Syrian refugees to deport them to Syria after they were rescued from a shipwreck on a trip to Europe on New Year's Eve.

The agency confirmed that a team from the Lebanese Navy and UN peacekeeping forces rescued 230 refugees who were on an illegal immigration boat on their way to Europe, adding that the Lebanese army transported 200 of the survivors in trucks and dropped them on the Syrian side of an unofficial border crossing in Wadi Khalid, which is a remote area in northeastern Lebanon, according to some survivors and human rights observers.

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