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On Tuesday, British charity Oxfam called in rich countries to let in at least 5% of Syria’s 3 million refugees, and urged them to improve their aid contributions. It also called on them to stop providing weapons to all parties involved in the Syrian conflict which are committing human rights violations.
The charity group slammed most of the international community for not sharing the burden of Syria’s neighbors over the massive influx of Syrian refugees, and said that several countries were not donating aid fairly.
“The international community is falling significantly short of even the minimum required of it. As a whole, the international community has not contributed nearly enough to the aid response, has left neighboring countries to cope with an ever-increasing number of refugees, and has failed to unite in order to halt transfers of arms and ammunition to Syria”, the group said in its report.
It also said that Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey were hosting a disproportionate amount of refugees.
“Oxfam is calling for a commitment from rich countries in particular to offer international protection by the end of 2015 to just five percent between them of the projected total Syrian refugee population”, it said.
According to the report, the group expects the resettlement of around 179,500 Syrian refugees if rich countries agree to share the refugee burden. So far, rich nations have agreed to accept only 1% of the Syrian refugee population, which crossed three million last month, according to UN statistics.
Oxfam urged rich nations to also increase aid donations, and said that they were contributing less than their “fair share” given their national income when compared to those of other donors.
The report singles out Russia, an ally of the Syrian regime, as particularly ungenerous, handing out only 1% of what it deems to be Russia’s share. Other countries like Denmark, Britain, Norway, Qatar and Kuwait, on the other hand, are contributing more than 100% of what would be their fair share, the report added.
