The US move to lift sanctions on Syria could encourage refugee returns, UN official says

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BEIRUT (AP) — The move by the United States to lift sweeping sanctions on Syria could encourage more refugees to return to their country and also help encourage investments, the head of the U.N. refugee agency in Lebanon said Thursday.

The U.S. Senate voted on Wednesday to permanently remove the so-called Caesar Act sanctions after President Donald Trump previously temporarily lifted the penalties by an executive order. The vote came as part of the passage of the country's annual defense spending bill. Trump is expected to sign off on the final repeal Thursday.

An estimated 400,000 Syrian refugees have eturned from Lebanon since the ouster of former Syrian President Bashar Assad in December in 2024 following a nearly 14-year civil war.

UNHCR Lebanon Representative Karolina Lindholm Billing said that around 1 million remain in Lebanon. About 636,000 of them are officially registered with the refugee agency.

Altogether, more than 1 million refugees have returned from neighboring countries and nearly 2 million internally displaced Syrians have returned to their homes since Assad’s fall.

Refugees returning from neighboring countries are eligible for cash payments of $600 per family upon their return, but with many coming back to destroyed houses and no work opportunities, the cash does not go far. Without jobs and reconstruction, many may leave again.

The aid provided so far by international organizations to help Syrians begin to rebuild has been on a “relatively small scale, compared to the immense needs,” Billing said, but the lifting of U.S. sanctions could “make a big difference.”

The World Bank estimates it will cost $216 billion to rebuild the homes and infrastructure damaged and destroyed in Syria's civil war.

“So what is needed now is big money in terms of reconstruction and private sector investments in Syria that will create jobs,” which the lifting of sanctions could encourage, Billing said.

Lawmakers imposed the wide-reaching Caesar Act sanctions on Syria in 2019 to punish Assad for human rights abuses during the country’s civil war.

Despite the temporary lifting of the sanctions by executive order, there has been little movement on reconstruction. Advocates of a permanent repeal argued that international companies are unlikely to invest in projects needed for the country’s rebuilding as long as there is a threat of sanctions returning.

While there has been a steady flow of returnees over the past year, other Syrians have fled the country since Assad's ouster by Islamist-led insurgents.

Many of them are members of religious minorities, fearful of being targeted by the new authorities. In particular, members of the Alawite sect to which Assad belonged and Shiites are fearful of being targeted in revenge attacks because of the support provided to Assad during the war by the Shiite-majority Iran and the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

Hundreds of Alawite civilians were killed in outbreaks of sectarian violence on Syria’s coast in March.

While the situation has calmed since then, Alawites continue to report sporadic sectarian attacks, including kidnappings and sexual assaults on women.

About 112,000 Syrians have fled to Lebanon since Assad’s fall, Billing said. Coming at a time of shrinking international aid, the new refugees have received very little assistance and generally do not have legal status in Lebanon.

“Their main need, one of the things they raise with us all the time, is documentation, because they have no paper to prove that they are in Lebanon, which makes it difficult for them to move around,” Billing said.

While some have returned to Syria after the situation calmed in their areas, she said, “many are very afraid of being returned to Syria because what they fled were very violent events.”

Also Thursday, U.N. deputy humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya urged donors to reverse a downward trend in funding for Syria. She said that while the United Nations reached 3.4 million Syrians with aid every month this year, it couldn’t help millions of others because the 2025 U.N. appeal for Syria was only 30% funded.

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Associated Press writer Edith Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.