Syria reconstruction would cost $73 billion: report

DAMASCUS - Agence France-Presse

A general view shows a heavily damaged street in Syria's eastern town of Deir Ezzor on August 26, 2013. AFP Photo

If the war in Syria suddenly stopped and reconstruction began today, around $73 billion would be needed to put the country back on track, a study published in Al-Watan newspaper said Tuesday.
 
Quoting Syrian real estate expert Ammar Yussef, the report said bombings, fighting and sabotage of infrastructure during the conflict had partially or completely destroyed 1.5 million dwellings.
 
The daily, which is close to President Bashar al-Assad's regime, added that reconstruction -- if it started now -- would involve 10,000 building sites, 15,000 trucks, 10,000 cement mixers and around six million workers.
 
The work would cost about $73 billion, according to Yussef.
 
More than 110,000 people have been killed since Syria's conflict broke out in March 2011, including over 40,100 civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
 
Compounding the chronic violence, hundreds died in an alleged poison gas attack on August 21 that shocked the world and was blamed by some Western and Arab countries on the Assad regime -- a claim it denies.
 
The United States and France are considering launching military action in Syria over the suspected gas attack.