Beirut, on February 4, 2014

His Eminence the Sheikh Akl of the Druze Unitarian Community the Sheikh Naim received at the House of the Community in Verdun the Minister of the Displaced Affairs at the provisionary government Alaeddine Terro and they discussed the steps that the Ministry will manage to complete in particular in Brih – Shouf and Chahar West.

His Eminence emphasized during the meeting “the necessity of completing all the files for the displaced’s return, and that are still pending due to some material details”, asserting that “the end of the displacement file represents an urgent priority that we should strive for in order to consolidate the values of coexistence that mark our daily life in different villages and regions of the Jabal, especially that the current dangerous situation requires a serious work in all the files, which fortifies the State’s power and grants the citizens a feeling of tranquility after being deprived from it in the light of the extremely bad security situation.

During the meeting, the Minister Terro declared: “I have informed his Eminence about the steps to be taken for the conciliation of Brih – Shouf where the Ministry of the Displaced has started paying the due sums to the damaged returning and residing including 200 residential units for the inhabitants. We will keep paying the due sums in Brih within the specific mechanism of the conciliation that took place and in the scope of the standards adopted for the conciliation of the Jabal. As soon as we accomplish the construction of churches and pay the indemnities to the inhabitants, we end the conciliation in presence of all the inhabitants. We have also informed his Eminence about the steps related to the indemnities of Chahar West and that were hindered by the inhabitants’ second payments and the adoration role as a result for the growing corruption in the Displaced’s fund due to the random and unfruitful obligations made by the Fund as well as some contractors in different regions and that were not among the Fund’s powers but the State’s services ministries’. In fact, the Fund should be held responsible for the payment of the sums and dues returning to the damaged and displaced people not to the infrastructure projects that have burdened the Fund with 23 milliard Lebanese Pounds and have deprived the damaged and displaced people. This sum would have been sufficient to finally close this file and not leaving it as a bleeding wound instead of wasting the money this way. This matter has become the concern of the Central Inspection and we hope it would come up with results and hold answerable whoever has committed this corruption”.