About 5,000 refugees are fleeing Syria each day, seeking safe haven from war and its devastating impact on basic living conditions, the United Nations said on Friday.
An acceleration in the exodus - up from 2,000 to 3,000 late last year - means the total could exceed one million refugees well before the end of June, its previous forecast, the U.N. refugee agency said.
"This is a full-on crisis,'' Adrian Edwards, spokesman of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR] told a news briefing in Geneva. "There was a huge increase in January alone, we're talking about a 25 percent increase in registered refugee numbers over a single month."
About 150,000 Syrians poured across Syria's borders in January, most into Jordan and Lebanon which have seen a massive increase in the inflow. Since the conflict began two years ago, more than 787,000 Syrians have registered as refugees or are awaiting processing in the region, mainly in Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan and Turkey. The total includes 15,000 in Egypt, where the U.N.'s World Food Programme began this week to distribute food vouchers.
Syrian Refugees by Country:
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Lebanon: 228,936
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Jordan: 222,762
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Turkey: 163,161
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Iraq: 79,469
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Egypt: 14,375
Source: UNHCR
"We are working around the clock to keep up with the needs and demands of the refugees,'' said UNHCR spokeswoman Sybella Wilkes.
The UNHCR, in a nearly $1 billion funding appeal in mid-December, forecast that there could be up to 1 million Syrian refugees by the end of June. "At the rate that refugees are arriving, we can expect to surpass the one million mark months before,'' Wilkes said.
Turkey has spent more than $600 million sheltering refugees from the conflict, Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek said. More than 177,000 Syrian refugees are in 16 camps with thousands more staying with relatives or in private accommodation.
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