Safe Haven for Abused Women in Lebanon
When Miermala arrived as a migrant worker in Lebanon from Sri Lanka 36 years ago, she carried dreams of a better life. Instead, she met with unimaginable hardship. She endured years of unpaid labor, physical abuse and eventually a brutal attack. Her injuries were severe, putting her into a coma. Doctors were later forced to amputate her leg.
And yet today Miermala has transformed her suffering into a mission to help other migrant workers. With the support of Catholic Relief Services partner Caritas Lebanon, she runs a shelter for women who have been abused, sexually assaulted or enslaved and often forced to work in isolation for years without pay.
Miermala, originally from Sri Lanka, runs a shelter in Lebanon for women who have been abused.
Photo by Stefanie Glinski for CRS
Miermala’s shelter has become a refuge for many of them, and a lifeline for women who have fled recent airstrikes across Lebanon.
One arrival, Margaret from Uganda, made her way there just days after the Israel‑Hezbollah war erupted. She had been working in Baalbek when bombs began falling.
“Everyone started running,” she says. When she asked her employers for her unpaid wages, they refused. “I left anyway,” she says, “It was too dangerous to stay.”
Leaving most of her belongings behind, Margaret trekked for days to reach Beirut, often on foot, with no transport available amid the chaos. Once in the capital, she was connected to Miermala’s shelter, where she is now waiting to be repatriated.
“I came to Lebanon for a better future, but I’ve lived through a nightmare,” she says.
At the shelter, Margaret has finally found safety, sharing a room with three other women—all waiting to go home. They spend their days knitting, crafting and occasionally dancing together outside. “This is the first place I’ve felt safe in Lebanon,” she says.
Another resident, Rosaline from Kenya, is also waiting for her return home. She had been working in southern Lebanon, hoping to support her two young children back home, when the airstrikes began.
“I told my employers I couldn’t work under these conditions and wanted to leave, but they locked me inside the house,” Rosaline says.
She managed to escape just before her employers fled the area. Soon after, the house was destroyed in an airstrike.
“I came here to give my children a better life, but it nearly cost me my own,” Rosaline says.
Perched high in the mountains above Beirut and surrounded by olive groves, the shelter has housed migrant women for 20 years, providing a safe haven even as fighter jets now pass overhead. Forty women currently live here, each waiting for the chance to return home.
With support from CRS, Caritas Lebanon is working closely with the International Organization for Migration to secure documents, book flights and arrange new passports for the women, many of whom had their passports confiscated by employers upon arrival in Lebanon.
As new arrivals seek shelter from both abusive conditions and escalating violence, Miermala says her mission keeps growing. She’s never returned to Sri Lanka, not even for a visit. She doesn’t want to leave Lebanon as she feels she’s needed here.
“I went through unimaginable heartbreak when I arrived here, but you can turn any situation into something good,” she tells the women, encouraging them to reclaim their lives too.
“I wouldn’t change anything about my life right now,” she reflects. “It’s brought me here, to this purpose. Now I’m able to serve others.”
