Since the Syrian Civil War started in March 2011, an estimated 9.5 million Syrians have
been
forced to flee their homes; over 3 million of those have fled the country.
The UN estimates that
by the end of this year, as many as 4 million Syrians could be living abroad as refugees.
So,
where are all of these displaced Syrians going -- and can the international community really
support 9 million displaced individuals?
Well, the majority of displaced Syrians, around 6.5 million, have fled their homes but are
still
living inside of Syria.
Other large groups of refugees have crossed into neighboring countries,
the majority of whom fled to Lebanon (~1.2 million of them) and Turkey (~1 million of
them),
although Jordan, Iraq, Egypt, and other North African countries also have a sizeable number.
But re-locating and providing services for 9.5 million refugees, soon to be almost 10.5
million,
can’t exclusively be a regional problem.
Syria and the surrounding areas just don’t have the
resources, or in some cases the stability, to house a refugee population of that size.
So, the
United Nations has called on the international community to help.
The EU and the US have
responded, but mainly in the form of financial support and humanitarian aid to Syria and
its
neighboring nations.
The US has given more than 2.9 billion dollars in humanitarian aid and the
EU has given roughly 3.5 billion dollars, but there aren’t many places willing to
take in refugees
on such a large scale.
Germany has agreed to shelter 28,500 Syrian refugees this year, which
is no small amount.
The US has agreed to take in roughly 33,000 refugees this year from
the Near East and South Asia regions, but they aren’t specifying Syrians.
So, some of those
slots may be taken up by asylum seekers from other countries.
The rest of the international
community plans on taking in at least 14,000 refugees in 2014, if not more.
A lot of these nations plan on increasing the number of refugees they can take on year
over
year, but for now - most of the responsibility for these displaced Syrians remains on Syria
and
its surrounding nations; a fact that is causing huge humanitarian problems for the region
and
adding undue stress to nations like Iraq and Lebanon, that are already struggling with
their own
stability issues.