Exodus of refugees from Syria exceeds one million

The relentless exodus of Syrians fleeing two years of increasingly violent conflict pushed the number of refugees in neighbouring countries past the million mark yesterday, the UN Refugee agency said, warning that resources for helping them are dangerously thin.

The total number of Syrians fleeing for safety to surrounding countries is much higher, UN officials said but, as the conflict approaches the start of its third year, the number who have registered as refugees or are seeking assistance has increased by about 420,000 this year.

Some 7,000-8,000 Syrians are leaving the country daily, refugee agency officials reported, adding that more than half of the arrivals are children, mostly under the age of 11.

“With a million people in flight, millions more displaced internally, and thousands of people continuing to cross the border every day, Syria is spiralling towards full-scale disaster,” the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, said in a statement. “The international humanitarian response capacity is dangerously stretched. This tragedy has to be stopped.”

About 330,000 Syrians have sought shelter in Lebanon, and close to 320,000 in Jordan, the refugee agency reported, with more than 185,000 in Turkey, 105,000 in Iraq, 43,500 in Egypt and about 8,000 across North Africa. Others have fled to Europe, it said.

To illustrate the strain this influx has imposed on Syria’s neighbours, the refugee agency said the population of Lebanon has swelled by 10 per cent, Jordan’s energy and water capacity and its health and education services are stretched to the limit, and Turkey has spent $600 million building 17 camps to house arrivals with more under construction.

In a separate report a day earlier, the United Nations depicted the collapse of Syria’s education system, saying thousands of schools have been damaged or converted into shelters for civilians, and many children have not attended class since the conflict began two years ago.

An additional worry for relief agencies is that the funding received from donors has failed to keep pace with the accelerating scale of refugee needs.

The United Nations said it has received only about 20 per cent of the $1.5 billion it requested in December to cover relief efforts for about four million people in desperate need of aid inside Syria, as well as the million who are now outside it during the first half of 2013. The number of refugees has accelerated faster than projected in that appeal. – (New York Times)