The U.N. refugee agency Tuesday urged rich nations to show solidarity with Syria's neighbors by making pledges to resettle the most vulnerable Syrian refugees. "We all know that the conflict in Syria has triggered the most dramatic humanitarian crisis the world has faced for a long time," U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Antonio Guterres told the first ever ministerial-level pledging conference on resettlement for Syrian refugees. "This opportunity today is an opportunity to express solidarity both to the Syrian people and to those countries around Syria that are the first line of defense of us all in relation to the risks of insecurity and instability that Syria has created," Guterres told delegates from around 40 countries. More than 3.2 million Syrians have registered as refugees in the region, with neighbors such as Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey bearing the brunt of the emergency. Syria's neighbors have been overwhelmed and have begun restricting access to people fleeing the conflict. "I have to say the world has a debt of gratitude to the neighboring countries that it probably never be able to fully pay and fully express," Guterres said. UNHCR wants to resettle 130,000 Syrians outside the region by the end of 2016 and is almost half way to reaching its goal, but with almost half of Syria's population either uprooted from their homes inside the country or refugees abroad, there will be a need for resettlement for years to come, the agency said. "What we aim at is the possibility to have in the near future resettlement or humanitarian admission opportunities for one tenth of the refugee population in the neighboring countries," Guterres said.
