The United States has recently contributed an additional 20 million U.S. dollars to the Syria Recovery Trust Fund, or SRTF, to help fund the rehabilitation of Syria. This brings U.S. contributions to the SRTF to a total of $60 million since the SRTF's inception in 2013. In total, the United States has contributed nearly 7 billion dollars in assistance for Syria since beginning of the crisis.
Since 2011, the Assad regime has committed atrocities against its people including chemical weapons attack against unarmed citizens. The ongoing civil war in Syria and the influx of ISIS forces have caused a massive refugee crisis.
Refugees from Syria number over 5 million, while internally displaced persons now number over 6.5 million, according to the UN Refugee Agency.
The United States is committed to assisting those affected by the terrible war in Syria and the surrounding area. Brett McGurk, Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, recently addressed this crisis:
“Our basic goal is to establish conditions that will allow the local population from the areas freed of ISIS control to restore life to their communities and voluntarily return IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons) to their homes.”
Our military actions and our stabilization planning "must move in parallel," said Special Envoy McGurk. "We have identified a hundred critical stabilization sites in and around Raqqa which will be the immediate focus for demining and restoration."
U.S. aid through the SRTF has helped refurbish medical facilities and provide medical equipment and supplies. It provides equipment and engineers to rehabilitate and expand electrical grids and water networks, provides food to those in need, and provides equipment and facilities to maintain wheat production for bakeries in Syria.
In order to complete our mission of liberation and stabilization in Syria, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said, “the international community… must remove obstacles to the defeat of ISIS and help provide stability… [to] prevent ISIS from rising anew from the ashes of their failed and fraudulent caliphate.”
