The United Nations said Thursday it sees no letup in refugees
fleeing war-ravaged Syria for neighboring Jordan, and appealed for funds to
help the kingdom cope with the influx. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said that it expected the
number of Syrian refugees in Jordan to increase by as much as 33 percent to up
to 800,000 by the end of this year.
The agency said Jordan was in desperate need of $2.6 billion to care
for the refugees. “We expect that the number of [Syrian] refugees will continue to
increase to some 700,000-800,000 by the end of this year,” said Andrew Harper,
representative of the UNHCR in Jordan. “There is a regional response plan and
national response plan, in which many aspects are still being finalized ...
basically $1 billion for the refugees and $1.6 billion for supporting Jordan’s
hosting community.”
