Jordan said on Thursday it would lead a campaign to raise funds for the UN agency that supports Palestinian refugees, to help it survive after the United States cut its funding.
Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said a meeting next month in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly would mobilize support for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East to continue core education and health services.
"Any shortage in funding will drive hundreds of thousands [of refugees] toward deprivation and despair," Safadi, whose country is home to 2.2 million U.N.-registered Palestinian refugees, said in Amman after meeting with UNRWA Director Pierre Krähenbühl.
Jordan will call for an Arab League meeting to lobby for donors to cover the $200 million shortfall needed to shore up UNRWA, Safadi said.
UNRWA has faced a cash crisis since the United States, its biggest donor, slashed funding earlier this year, saying the agency needed to make unspecified reforms and calling on the Palestinians to renew peace talks with Israel.
UNRWA now looks after more than 5 million people it defines as Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
"One cannot wish 5.3 million Palestine refugees away," Krähenbühl said at a news conference with Safadi. "These are people who have rights and for many years now, for decades have faced a plight and injustice that is simply immense."
"As long as a just, lasting solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict has not been found, we will continue to implement the mandate that the General Assembly has given us," he said.
The Palestinians assert the right under international law to return to homes abandoned in Palestine or be compensated. Safadi said funding cuts for UNRWA undermine that right.
"The continuation of UNRWA means continued commitment by the international community to working towards a just solution of the refugees that guarantees the right of return and compensation," Safadi said.
Safadi last week raised the plight of UNRWA with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Washington where officials say he warned of "dangerous consequences" to regional stability if the financial crisis is not resolved.
