World powers pledge USD 10 billion in aid for Syria

The package also includes $290 million to bolster education funding in Jordan and Lebanon, where 300,000 Syrian refugee youths have fled due to their country’s five-year-old civil war.

But Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu warned delegates at the conference that a Russian bombing campaign in Syria’s Aleppo province was driving a new exodus of refugees toward the Turkish border.

Some £4.1 billion has been pledged this year at a donor conference being held in London and a further £3.4 billion will be handed over by 2020, the Prime Minister said.

“Only political dialogue will rescue the Syrian people from their intolerable suffering”, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the meeting.

The conference, which came just one day after peace talks in Geneva were suspended, aims to raise at least $9 billion, organizers said.

“In supporting our refugee response you will not only be addressing the urgent needs of millions, you will be helping my country continue to do the right thing – fulfilling a critical role in our region and staying strong for the world”.

“It is clear that the countries surrounding Syria are now overwhelmed by refugees for instance Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey”.

Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose open-door policy for refugees has proved deeply controversial in Germany, offered 2.3 billion euros ($2.6 billion) by 2018.

“There is no military solution”, Ban said.

Previous aid conferences for Syria have repeatedly fallen short.

For European nations, improving the humanitarian situation in Syria and neighbouring countries is crucial to reducing incentives for Syrians to travel to Europe, where a large refugee influx has put many countries under severe strain.

The Russian intervention in the Syrian conflict has helped the Assad regime, which had suffered major setbacks before Moscow entered the fray.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was no more upbeat. The total amount of money that the US has donated to help Syrians over the past four years has reached $5.1 billion, which is the highest amount that has been pledged for this clause by a single donor.

Donor countries also want to see the refugees employed on infrastructure projects – which would also benefit the host nations – or in special business zones where Syrians and local people can work side by side.

One million children now not in school will have access to education by the end of the school year.

EU President Donald Tusk said that “after so many years of conflict, people have lost hope. We can not have a generation of refugees left out of school, unable to get work, vulnerable to extremism and radicalization”, Cameron said. We urge the administration to uphold American ideals by welcoming many more of the most vulnerable Syrian refugees to our nation where they can rebuild their lives.