Francis Noel Duffy (Dublin South West, Green Party)
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444. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he will report on his recent visit to Jordan. [57346/21]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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As part of the Government's pledge to bring 2,900 Syrian refugees to Ireland from Jordan and Lebanon by the end of 2023, a team from my Department's Irish Refugee Protection Programme (IRPP), accompanied by members of an Garda Síochána travelled to Jordan to meet with and interview refugees for relocation to Ireland. As part of this mission, I travelled to Jordan to join the end of their mission and see the conditions and the processes in place.

The trip included meetings with the Minister for Social Development and the Minister for Planning and International Cooperation in the Jordanian government. I also visited the UNHCR Registration Centre, where our IRPP team had been interviewing refugees, and met with senior officials from the UNHCR. I was also grateful to meet with a family from Syria who will be relocated to Ireland in the coming months, and hear their experiences of the system in Jordan and their hopes for their move to Ireland.

I also visited the Za’athari Refugee Camp - one of the biggest camps for Syrian refugees - where I met with Jordanian and UN officials. I was also afforded a tour of the camp, and I met with more Syrian families.