Syrian refugees residing in Turkish camps and cities have reached 1.05 million, according to a statement made today by the country’s Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay.
Turkey is the sixth-largest refugee hosting country in the world.
Turkey, which historically embraces an “open border” policy since 2011, has created 22 camps in ten provinces to receive Syrian refugees.
The camps hold over 220,000 people. An initiative of the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency, the camps are located in the southern part of the country, bordering Syria.
Providing free healthcare, education and eased legal pathways for asylum seekers, Turkey has constructed the infrastructure to support refugees seeking to create new life.
While the camps have received many crossing the border, about 65 percent refugees have chosen to live outside the camps in cities. The majority of refugees living in cities are in the provinces of Hatay, Gaziantep and Sanliurfa.
Living on average seven people per home, many Syrians have chosen to live in the cities due to overcrowding of the camps and greater employment opportunities.
In April 2013, the Turkish government created the General Directorate of Migration Management to handle Syrian refugee affairs. Turkey has spent an estimated $2.5 billion on its efforts to host Syrian refugees.
To help support Turkish efforts for holding Syrian refugees, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR) has approved $195 million for 2014.
The United States provided $1.3 billion and the European Union contributed $3.6 billion in humanitarian assistance.
According to the UNCHR, over 2.8 million people have fled Syria since the beginning of the conflict, and nine million have been displaced. Over one million refugees are in Lebanon as well, a country with a population of 4.3 million.
Additional host countries include Jordan, Iraq and Egypt. An estimated 160,000 people have been killed since 2011.
Other largely represented groups of refugees and asylum seekers in Turkey are from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Somalia, amounting to approximately 73,000 people of concern apart from Syrians.