Report on the Archbishopric and the Syrian Crisis

Report on the Archbishopric and the Syrian Crisis
Greek Catholic Archbishopric
Of Lattakieh and Christian Valley
LATTAKIEH-SYRIA

Material damage

  1. Al Hosn parish
    1. Church and presbytery broken into and damaged
    2. Waqf Rest Home and shops dependent on the church completely looted and wrecked. Estimated cost of repair $40,000
    3. 73 families made homeless and jobless, their homes devastated and demolished
    4. Two priests and their families made homeless
  2. Damage to other churches hit by shells. Estimated cost of repair $10,000
  3. Assistance by the Eparchy’s Welfare Committee to displaced and arrested persons as of 15 June 2013:
    Location Number of displaced families
    Christian Valley 900 families
    Safita 120 families
    Lattakieh 75 families
    Tartus 120 families
    Total 1215 families

Areas of urgent need

  1. Rent
  2. Food, baby milk
  3. Clothing
  4. Furniture, beds, blankets, sheets
  5. Refrigerators, kitchen utensils
  6. General medicines, surgery, drugs
  7. Detergents
  8. Heating, fuel, stoves, gas
  9. Bursaries
General relief to displaced persons, reckoned at $100 per month: $120,000
Help with cost of monthly rent for 700 families at $100: $70,000
Monthly total: $190,000

Demographic situation

Displaced persons come from:

  • Homs
  • Qusayr
  • Damascus
  • Hama and district
  • Idlib
  • Deir-al-Zor
  • Tabka (various regions)
  • Lattakieh’s suburbs
  • Ghassanieh
  • Hassakeh
  • Kaussabba

Economic situation

  1. All the displaced families are living below the poverty threshold and have resorted to the help provided in order to survive
  2. Most displaced persons are unemployed because their shops have been looted and destroyed and they cannot return home
  3. Many civil servants are no longer in receipt of their salaries
  4. There is inflation as things become more expensive due to scarcity.
+Mgr. Nicholas Sawaf
Archbishop of Lattakieh and Christian Valley