BEIRUT: Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil pledged support to remote Christian areas in north Lebanon as he kicked of a tour of Akkar Sunday.

Visiting the small border village of Ramah, where he had launched a water well and new lighting for the town, Bassil said that “In this remote border region that is far from the central [government] ... water and services are a right that the state owes to the people.”

"Since 1943, not a single official has visited this border area,” the town’s retired mayor Hanna Makdessi said, while emphasizing that the area “suffers from great deprivation.”

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