850,000 Syrian refugees return home since Assad’s fall

 

Kelly Clements, Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees, told the Associated Press in Damascus that around 1.7 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) who fled their communities during the 14-year-long conflict have also returned to their local communities.

The Syrian conflict, which began in March 2011, has resulted in the deaths of nearly half a million people and the displacement of half of the country’s pre-war population of 23 million. More than five million Syrians fled abroad, primarily to neighboring countries.

Clements emphasized that each individual has a different reason for returning now, while others are postponing their return to assess how circumstances will evolve.

In late July, a young man named Youssef al-Labbad, who had returned from Germany, was killed under torture in a detention center in Damascus, just days after being arrested without charges. This incident highlights the ongoing human rights violations within the detention facilities of the transitional government in Syria.