Some 180,000 Syrians born in Turkey since war began

ANKARA - Anadolu Agency

REUTERS photo

Nearly 180,000 Syrians have been born in Turkey over the last five years, according to Turkey’s Health Ministry.

A total of 177,568 Syrians mothers – refugees of the country’s bloody civil war – gave birth in Turkey between April 2011 and September 2016, according to the ministry’s figures.

The country is already home to roughly 3 million Syrian refugees who fled the war, more than any other country in the world, and has spent $25 billion helping and sheltering them.      
 
Among them, over 1 million are child refugees, making Turkey the biggest host of child refugees in the world.        
Such a responsibility includes not only providing them with accommodation but also offering them health care, as well as education and other services.        

Healthcare services are provided for free at eight field hospitals and 65 health centers in refugee camps.
        
Syria has been locked in a devastating civil war since early 2011, when the Bashar al-Assad government cracked down on pro-democracy protests – which erupted as part of the Arab Spring uprisings – with unexpected ferocity.        

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people are believed to have been killed and millions more displaced by the conflict.        

Following a nationwide cease-fire brokered by Turkey and Russia, an upcoming meeting in Astana is aimed at promoting a political solution to the six-year war. Negotiations between Syrian government and opposition negotiators are due to begin there on Jan. 23.