In London, each of Al Awda Center and AGPS received, noon yesterday, a written message from the Vice-President Office of the EU Commission, “Federica Mgrena”, in response to the joint memorandum that was sent to the European Union, which explores the suffering the Palestinian refugees during the ongoing war in Syria.
The letter noted that the Union concern supporting UNRWA is the key element in the strategy to pay for stability in the Middle East and facilitate the achievement of peace, stressing that the Union and its members are still one of the largest donor to UNRWA, where the percentage contribution of the European Union in support of UNRWA in 2014 has reached 34% , which is distributed in five provinces; Gaza, West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria, noting that the Union, this year, adopted a resolution on UNRWA’s financial contribution of up to 82 million Euros.
Further to the content of the memo sent to the European Union, which included a paragraph claimed expanding the UNRWA’s work to include the rest of the areas where the Palestinian Syrian refugees are; which is outside UNRWA’s scope currently. The message noted that the EU will support each of “UNRWA” and UNHCR, to ensure a coherent and integrated approach, enabling them to offer their services for refugees who are under their mandate.
At the same time, the message pointed out that the expansion of UNRWA’s operations and mandate of the other areas will be difficult to achieve, where the process requires working through the United Nations General Assembly.
It is noteworthy that the AGPS and Al Awda Center in London, in the beginning of last month, sent a number of letters to each of the European Union, the British government, and the UNHCR in the United Nations, which spoke in details about the situation of the Palestinians of Syria, that was documented in the AGPS reports; latest of which was entitled “The Palestinians of Syria, the Wound is still Bleeding.”