U.N. Holds Emergency Meeting over 300,000 Displaced Syrians

Sweden, which holds the United Nations Security Council’s rotating presidency, and Kuwait requested an emergency, closed-door meeting at the UN Security Council on Tuesday to complain that Israel and Jordan will not accept hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees displaced by Russian-backed bombings in southern Daraa, Syria.

The AFP reported that approximately 300,000 people have fled to the Jordanian and Israeli borders since ongoing bombings ravaged Syria’s southwest province of Daraa starting on June 19.

“Intense air and ground based strikes have reportedly continued in multiple areas in Syria’s Daraa Governorate, resulting in the death and injury of civilians and the largest displacement in the area since the conflict began,” U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq reportedly told the media.

“The situation of internally displaced people at the Jordanian border is precarious, aggravated by dusty desert winds and high temperatures of up to 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit),” he reportedly said.

Although Jordan and Israel have said they will keep their borders closed, Israel has reportedly transferred food, tents, and medicine to Syrian refugees who are located on its border, and has also provided some medical treatment.

Jordan, which has reportedly taken in 650,000 Syrian refugees in, says it does not have the capacity to let in any more people.
Several countries are starting to feel the burden of accepting foreign refugees into their countries. This week, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has long been an advocate for accepting more refugees, held emergency talks with her Bavarian allies to come to an immigration deal that will tighten borders in Germany.

In 2015, Merkel opened Germany’s borders to immigrants – many of them fleeing war-torn counties like Syria and less affluent nations that are part of the European Union – which “resulted in the German government granting protection to hundreds of thousands of refugees. Merkel reportedly called it a ‘national duty’ to do so.”

Adelle Nazarian is a politics and national security reporter for Breitbart News. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.