The world has been grappling with the Syrian refugee crisis. While the U.S. secretary of state has recently announced that the U.S. will increase the number of refugees it accepts each year, according to HNGN, it has emerged that of the thousands of refugees seeking asylum, only one in five is from Syria.
The E.U.'s official statistical agency, Eurostat, shows that migration from April to June was almost double the level of the same period in 2014. The agency also recorded that the migrants came from places like Afghanistan, Bangladesh and South Sudan, reports Breitbart News. Out of the 213,000 arrivals logged in April, May and June, only 44,000 were fleeing the Syrian civil war.
Human rights campaigners have been urging developed nations to accept more Syrian refugees.
"This exposes the lie peddled in some quarters that vast numbers of those reaching Europe are from Syria. Most people who are escaping the war will go to camps in Lebanon or Jordan. Many of those who have opted to risk their lives to come to Europe have done so for economic reasons," said David Davies, Tory MP for Monmouth according to The Daily Mail.
"These figures make extremely disturbing reading. The whole argument has been made that this influx is all real refugees from Syria whereas this adds to the substantial evidence that there are a large number of economic migrants who are aiming for a better life," said fellow Tory, Sir Bill Cash.
Britain "must not be viewed as an easy means of settlement by those who are not actually refugees. We need systems which keep out unfounded claims so we can all respond more quickly and effectively to those genuinely in need of refuge," said a British Home Office spokesperson, reports The Express.
