The Sierra Leone Government together with the UN’s International Office for Migration (IOM) is planning to rescue about 200 Sierra Leoneans from Lebanon, Middle East.

This revelation was made by the Sierra Leone’s Labour Minister, Mohamed Rahman Swaray in a TV interview with AYV.

“We have been working with IOM and other government partners and arrangements are now afoot to ensure that the first set of about 200 Sierra Leoneans from Lebanon are repatriated,” the Minister said.

Swaray added that the government is challenged with accounting for the number of Sierra Leoneans stranded in the Middle East country since some went there on their own and not through agencies.

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“We have quite a large Sierra Leonean population there (in Lebanon) with most of them in the domestic work industry but we cannot account for the numbers because they all went there not through designated private agencies but on their own,” he said.

At least 2,600 people have been killed by Israeli military in Lebanon since their escalation with Shia militia group, Hezbollah. Most Sierra Leoneans working in the south of the country where attacks are higher were forced to flee to the capital, Beirut forcing them to sleep in makeshift shelters and on the streets in dehumanising conditions.

Some Sierra Leoneans have criticised their government for the slow response in repatriating their citizens back home after reports of some suffering from injuries caused by fragments.

However, this recent revelation by the labour minister signified a last grip of hope for the hundreds of Sierra Leoneans stranded in Lebanon.