Worst refugee crisis in nearly 25 years as over 4 million flee Syria says UN

The total number people fleeing the conflict in Syria to neighbouring countries has now passed the four million mark, the United Nations reported on Thursday. It is the single biggest refugee crisis handled by the world body in almost half a century, the UN refugee agency said.

The total number of Syrian refugees in neighbouring countries is now at least 4,013,000 people and at least another 7.6 million are displaced inside Syria, many of whom are living in inaccessible locations in adverse conditions, said UNHCR.

"This is the biggest refugee population from a single conflict in a generation," said UNHCR chief Antonio Guterres.

Turkey is now home to around 45 percent (1,805,255) of all Syrian refugees in the region, while 1,172,753 are sheltering in Lebanon, 629,128 in Jordan, 249,726 in Iraq, 132,375 in Egypt and 24,055 elsewhere in North Africa, UNHCR said.

A further 270,000 Syrians have requested asylum in Europe, and thousands of others have been resettled from the region elsewhere, it added.

"It is a population that needs the support of the world but is instead living in dire conditions and sinking deeper into poverty,” said Guterres.

The number of refugees is expected to reach 4.27 million by the end of the year, as the five-year-old conflict is driving increasing numbers of people from their homes according to UNHCR.

While growing numbers of Syrian refugees are heading for Europe and other continents, the overwhelming majority are remaining in the region, Guterres said.

"We cannot afford to let them and the communities hosting them slide further into desperation.”

Inside their homeland and in host countries, uprooted Syrians are suffering increasing poverty and hunger, inadequate health care and shelter, with children paying the heaviest price, according to UNHCR.

Child labour, begging and child marriages are on the rise and many parents struggle to send their children to school and meet the family's basic medical costs, UNHCR said.

At the end of June, only around a quarter of the humanitarian funds requested by UNHCR had been received, meaning drastic cuts in food aid that make life even tougher for exiled Syrians, the agency said.

A massive 86 per cent of refugees outside camps in Jordan live below the poverty line of 3.2 dollars a day, UNHCR said.