Unfolding Genocide in Syria- UN Security Council Briefing

The world was not only watching the destruction of a country, but also that of a people, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs said of the crisis in Syria, stressing in a briefing to the Security Council yesterday that the statistics “hide an unfolding humanitarian tragedy”.

“We have not seen a refugee flow escalate at such an alarming rate since the Rwandan genocide.” Syria’s neighbours had provided shelter to a huge number, but the impact on them was crushing and the continuing influx could send them “over the edge”. 

"At least 92,000 people had been killed between March 2011 and the end of April 2013. Of those killed, at least 6,500 were minors under the age of 10. Children were also being detained, tortured and recruited as soldiers, he said, adding that at least 86 child combatants had been killed in the hostilities. The approximately 5,000 monthly killings demonstrated the drastic deterioration of the conflict".

Approximately 77 % of the refugees were women and children, and 66 % of those were in north Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley, the regions closest to the Syrian border and also the country’s poorest. Amid the continuing violence in Syria, the number of refugees and others displaced to Lebanon was projected to reach 1.2 million by the end of 2013, or the equivalent of more than one fourth the smaller country’s own population.

While Lebanon and Jordan bore the heaviest burden, the impact on Iraqi Kurdistan should not be forgotten, nor the effect on Turkey owing to the 400,000 refugees who had sought safety there.

Source: UN