DAMASCUS (AFP) — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad met UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres on Wednesday to discuss the plight of Iraqi refugees in Syria, official news agency SANA reported.
They discussed "cooperation between the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and Syria with regard to improving the conditions (of refugees) and finding solutions to their problems," SANA added.
Assad said all the "parties concerned need to assume their responsibilities" toward the refugees, while Guterres thanked Syria which has taken in 1.5 million Iraqi refugees.
Since October 1, the number of Iraqis travelling to Syria has dropped after new visa conditions were imposed by Damascus.
Almost 45,000 Iraqi refugees in Syria have returned home since mid-September, including 20,000 who travelled back in December, the Iraqi Red Cross said in January.
Of the 1.5 million Iraqis in Syria, the UN estimates there are 153,516 who are formally registered as refugees from the conflict that has wracked Iraq since the US-led invasion of March 2003.
Most fled after the bombing of a Shiite in Samarra in February 2006 that sparked deadly sectarian conflict between Iraq's Sunnis and Shiites. At one stage, up to 60,000 Iraqis were fleeing across the border every month.
Iraqis are once again leaving Iraq for Syria in greater numbers than are returning, despite the lower level of bloodshed in their homeland, the UN refugee agency said earlier this month.
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