Cyprus will offer €2.3 million to help Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon in 2016 through the EU, Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides announced on Thursday.
The help was offered in the framework of a Syrian Donor Conference which took place in London with the participation of over 70 countries and which resulted in the international community pledging over 10 billion dollars, with countries such as Germany offering €2.3 billion up to 2018, Britain 1.2 billion pounds up to 2020 and the US adding $900 million to the $4.5 billion already pledged.
In addition to the monetary support pledged, Cyprus will also give Syrian refugees the opportunity to attend post-graduate courses in Cypriot universities.
“We did not give the €2.3 million which would have been, under normal circumstances, given to Turkey, in the framework of the €3 billion agreed with the EU, but rather we pledged to make available the same amount for the Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon,” Kasoulides told CNA.
The second part of the Cypriot contribution, he added, “has to do with the establishment of a scholarship fund in cooperation with the Ministry of Education on the basis of which we will grant post-graduate scholarships to Syrian refugee students for a period of five years of a total cost of €500,000.”
All leaders who spoke at the conference highlighted the fact that while financial support is important, what is needed in the long term is a political solution to the civil war in Syria, a position the Cypriot FM also expressed in his statements.
“The problem must be resolved at its roots in Syria; it is a political problem,” Kasoulides pointed out.
He further expressed the point of view that the Syrian negotiations should have been split in two areas, political and humanitarian so that no side is allowed to put forward conditions, as has now been the case, regarding the humanitarian nature of the crisis.
He also noted that the hopes the Geneva talks have only stalled temporarily.