Humanitarian crisis: Syria's nightmare
The UN, as the number of refugees passed the 2 million mark, has declared Syria the 21st century's worst crisis
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The civil war in Syria
is a tragedy. It is a tragedy for its people, whose lives and homes
have been damaged in many cases beyond repair, and for millions of
children who have endured terrible events and whose futures are now
unimaginably bleak. It is a tragedy for a country that for hundreds of
generations accommodated such diversity of faith and whose towns and
cities reflected a long and distinguished history. And in a different
way, it is a global tragedy, for much of the world seems indifferent to
the suffering, paralysed by its intractability and reluctant to confront
the urgent need for action.
Refugee camps are wretched places, home only to the utterly desperate. Syrians fleeing the fighting and the catastrophic breakdown in security and services shun them if they possibly can, and rent a room or a garage – any covered space in the security of any town across the border in Jordan or Lebanon (where refugees are now a quarter of the population) that they can find. Only the completely indigent, those who have lost everything, arrive at camps like Zataari in Jordan, now holding more than 100,000 people and growing at the rate of about 10,000 a week. The bitterly cold Middle Eastern winter is approaching and on Tuesday the UN, as the number of refugees passed the 2 million mark, declared Syria the 21st century's worst crisis. The commissioner for refugees, António Guterres, described it as a "disgraceful humanitarian calamity with suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history". Yet despite nightly evidence of the truth of his observations, pledges of funds seem reluctantly made. Even groups providing the most strictly neutral and self-evidently beneficial aid, such as the medical charity MSF, report a slow response.
In the context of a civil war, emergency relief is always tough to deliver. In Syria, aid workers face even more than the usual obstacles. In the Commons on Tuesday William Hague, the foreign secretary, attacked the Assad regime for delaying over visas, and hindering internal movement. On the ground, it is acutely dangerous for the NGO personnel, and reaching the 4 million displaced people – a tenth of the population – who are still in Syria but not in their own homes is often almost impossible. The UN, which works with many national and regional agencies, is not the only player: large amounts of bilateral aid are coming from Syria's Arab neighbours. But because this is not integrated into the wider relief effort, it is hard to co-ordinate efforts. There are gaps and wasteful duplications.
That, though, is a much smaller problem than the underfunding of the UN's humanitarian relief programme, which needs about £1bn to help displaced people in Syria itself, and its refugee relief programme, which wants £2bn just to look after the millions fleeing their homes until the end of the year. Fortunately, a solution is at hand, for on Thursday the 20 richest countries in the world meet in St Petersburg. At the very top of the agenda should be a session where every participant pledges as much as it takes to meet the overwhelming humanitarian need. It should not stop there. There is also a real danger that the burden of refugees could destabilise Jordan and Lebanon, economically and politically, the way the great exodus of Rwandan refugees after the genocide in 1994 destabilised the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
But the only real answer is to get the diplomatic process moving towards Geneva 2, the route that the UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is proposing. One way of breaking the impasse might be a Syrian contact group, representing all the countries with an interest in the region. Bringing together all the participants' external sponsors would mean, as Douglas Alexander argued at the weekend and Shirley Williams has suggested , including the Assad regime's main backers, Iran as well as Russia. Not an easy option, but even some Tories privately agree that the scale of the tragedy could make it necessary. On Tuesday, Mr Hague rejected the idea. He should think again.
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Humanitarian crisis: Syria's nightmare
Refugee camps are wretched places, home only to the utterly desperate. Syrians fleeing the fighting and the catastrophic breakdown in security and services shun them if they possibly can, and rent a room or a garage – any covered space in the security of any town across the border in Jordan or Lebanon (where refugees are now a quarter of the population) that they can find. Only the completely indigent, those who have lost everything, arrive at camps like Zataari in Jordan, now holding more than 100,000 people and growing at the rate of about 10,000 a week. The bitterly cold Middle Eastern winter is approaching and on Tuesday the UN, as the number of refugees passed the 2 million mark, declared Syria the 21st century's worst crisis. The commissioner for refugees, António Guterres, described it as a "disgraceful humanitarian calamity with suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history". Yet despite nightly evidence of the truth of his observations, pledges of funds seem reluctantly made. Even groups providing the most strictly neutral and self-evidently beneficial aid, such as the medical charity MSF, report a slow response.
In the context of a civil war, emergency relief is always tough to deliver. In Syria, aid workers face even more than the usual obstacles. In the Commons on Tuesday William Hague, the foreign secretary, attacked the Assad regime for delaying over visas, and hindering internal movement. On the ground, it is acutely dangerous for the NGO personnel, and reaching the 4 million displaced people – a tenth of the population – who are still in Syria but not in their own homes is often almost impossible. The UN, which works with many national and regional agencies, is not the only player: large amounts of bilateral aid are coming from Syria's Arab neighbours. But because this is not integrated into the wider relief effort, it is hard to co-ordinate efforts. There are gaps and wasteful duplications.
That, though, is a much smaller problem than the underfunding of the UN's humanitarian relief programme, which needs about £1bn to help displaced people in Syria itself, and its refugee relief programme, which wants £2bn just to look after the millions fleeing their homes until the end of the year. Fortunately, a solution is at hand, for on Thursday the 20 richest countries in the world meet in St Petersburg. At the very top of the agenda should be a session where every participant pledges as much as it takes to meet the overwhelming humanitarian need. It should not stop there. There is also a real danger that the burden of refugees could destabilise Jordan and Lebanon, economically and politically, the way the great exodus of Rwandan refugees after the genocide in 1994 destabilised the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
But the only real answer is to get the diplomatic process moving towards Geneva 2, the route that the UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is proposing. One way of breaking the impasse might be a Syrian contact group, representing all the countries with an interest in the region. Bringing together all the participants' external sponsors would mean, as Douglas Alexander argued at the weekend and Shirley Williams has suggested , including the Assad regime's main backers, Iran as well as Russia. Not an easy option, but even some Tories privately agree that the scale of the tragedy could make it necessary. On Tuesday, Mr Hague rejected the idea. He should think again.
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Humanitarian crisis: Syria's nightmare
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