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UNHCR discusses the Syrian refugee crisis, as 200,000 Syrians flee to Turkey

UNHCR representative Carol Batchelor spoke with UPI about the challenging humanitarian situation in Turkey as the refugee agency and donor country strive to meet the needs of more than 1.35 million Syrian refugees.

By JC Finley
UNHCR Representative in Turkey Carol Batchelor told UPI that educating Syrian refugee children is crucial. (Twitter/OCHA/MMoteran)
UNHCR Representative in Turkey Carol Batchelor told UPI that educating Syrian refugee children is crucial. (Twitter/OCHA/MMoteran)

WASHINGTON, Sept. 22 (UPI) -- An estimated 200,000 people have fled Syria over a four-day period to escape advances by Islamic State militants.

The figure, reported by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Monday, demonstrates an unprecedented mass movement in the three-year-old conflict.

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Most of the 200,000 Syrians fled to Turkey, the monitoring agency said.

Lilli Tnaib, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, posted a map to Twitter showing the nine border crossings Syrian refugees used over the weekend.

UPI spoke with the UNHCR's representative in Turkey, Carol Batchelor last week, regarding the Syrian refugee crisis.

To date, UNHCR estimates there are approximately 1.35 million Syrian refugees in Turkey, 847,266 of whom have registered as refugees.

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The U.N. budget to provide for those refugees is only 21 percent funded.

Batchelor applauded the U.S. for its generous humanitarian assistance. "We want to thank the United States and the American people for acknowledging that it's important to support refugees. ... It's thanks to the United States, to BPRM [the State Department's Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration], to the authorities, to the Executive Branch, the Hill, and so on for recognizing refugees in Turkey need support, not only for their immediate needs -- this goes to policy."

"If there is solidarity and international engagement and support for refugees in Turkey, it will help Turkey be able to keep its doors open and to absorb ever increasing numbers."

Turkey opened its doors to the first Syrian refugees on April 29, 2011.

"For the first year and half or so, really the plan was everybody could be hosted in camps." Doing so, Batchelor explained, made it easier for Turkey to provide healthcare. "Their policy was always: medical care is provided." At that time, most of the camps were in one province.

As the number of Syrian refugees grew in 2012, more camps opened in Turkey and expanded to other provinces. The surge of refugees reached a "critical" level between 2013 and 2014, Batchelor noted, and "the numbers just became too massive."

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Today, the vast majority of Syrian refugees in Turkey reside outside of camps and live in urban settings.

Not having imagined the conflict in Syria would persist for more than three years, many refugees outside the camps still struggle with language differences in their temporary country, where residents speak Turkish instead of Arabic.

Language differences and economic hardship have led to what the U.N. classifies as "negative coping mechanisms," including less than 20 percent of Syrian refugee children in Turkey attending school and a reliance on children as breadwinners.

In order to overcome such "negative coping mechanisms," UNHCR is working with Turkish authorities to expand employment and educational opportunities to Syrian refugees.

Work empowers the refugee and promotes self-sufficiency, which decreases reliance on humanitarian assistance and frees the children to go to school, Batchelor explained.

With regard to education, UNHCR is working with Turkish officials -- who have offered primary education to refugees -- to move forward with a revised Syrian curriculum taught in Arabic and also teaches refugee children Turkish.

"We really need support from our partners and donors globally to help with these things. All of it is linked. The education of the child is linked to what the parent is able to do to access, to some degree, the labor market.

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"Planning for medium and long-term strategies -- it doesn't mean that Syrians will stay forever in Turkey. ... They want the chance to go home. But the question is: what skills will they go home with?

"Here is an opportunity to strengthen their skill set because they are going to need every coping mechanism and strategy possible to rebuild their country."

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