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Five million may be homeless in Syria after quake: UN | Earthquakes News

The UN official in Syria said a “crisis within a crisis” also made it more difficult to deliver aid.

More than 5 million Syrians may be left homeless after Monday’s devastating earthquake hit the country and neighboring Turkey, according to a United Nations official.

“Up to 5.3 million people in Syria may have been displaced by the earthquake,” said Sivanka Dhanapala, Syria representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). “It’s a huge number and involves a population that has suffered from mass displacement.”

For Syria, this is a crisis within a crisis.

Survivors of the magnitude 7.8 and 7.6 earthquakes have flocked to camps set up for those displaced after nearly 12 years of war from other parts of Syria. Many people lost their homes or were too scared to return to damaged buildings.

About 24,000 people were killed across Turkey and Syria because of the earthquake – more than 3,300 of them in Syria.

Dhanapala said UNHCR was “rushing aid” to hard-hit areas of Syria, but “it was very, very difficult”.

“There are 6.8 million people who have been displaced within the country. And this was before the earthquake.”

Meanwhile, a second UN aid convoy of 14 trucks has entered rebel-held areas of Syria – after the initial six had gone on Thursday.

The Syrian government has speak it will allow the delivery of aid to rebel-held areas beyond its control, in cooperation with the United Nations and humanitarian organisations.

“The full scale of the devastation in Syria is just beginning to come to light,” said Al Jazeera’s Kristen Saloomey, reporting from the United Nations in New York.

Despite an increasing number of aid convoys passing through an authorized border point to reach the worst-affected areas, our correspondent says critics say there is still too little and too much to do. late.

“Majority [people made homeless from the quake are] in areas that the Syrian government doesn’t control, where people have been displaced after years of war,” she said.

On Friday, the United Nations also announced an additional $25 million in emergency funding for Syria, bringing the total to date to $50 million, Saloomey said, “but a review team is now in place. and demand is expected to far exceed that number.”

The conflict in Syria began in 2011 with the brutal suppression of peaceful protests, and escalated with the involvement of foreign powers and armed groups.

Nearly half a million people have been killed and the conflict has forced about half of the country’s pre-war population to flee their homes, many of whom sought refuge in Turkey.



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