Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya announced on Saturday that some 550,000 Syrian refugees returned home from Türkiye to post-Assad Syria.
The U.N. refugee agency on Friday said that 1.16 million Syrians had returned to the country after Assad's regime fell on Dec. 8, 2024, and some 1.9 million internally displaced people had been able to return to their homes.
According to the U.N., more than 7 million Syrians continue to be internally displaced and some 4.5 million refugees remain abroad.
Speaking in Kilis, a southern Turkish province which once hosted the largest number of refugees in proportion to its population, Yerlikaya said the number of Syrians returning home since 2016 exceeded 1.2 million.
The numbers are significant, as they show that refugees who have called Türkiye home since the unrest began in the country’s southern neighbor more than a decade ago are eager to return. Most refugees went on to build new lives and families expanded over time. They had little prospect of returning home as the country succumbed to further devastation due to years of conflict.
Türkiye eased restrictions on its border crossings with Syria after the fall of the Baathist regime, but the number of returnees fluctuated between 1,300 and 1,400 people daily initially.
Authorities expected a rise in returns when schools started summer recess in June, and the projections proved true. After June 20, daily crossings reached 2,500. At one point, numbers receded due to the Iran-Israel conflict that threatened to push the region into another episode of turmoil, but following a fragile cease-fire between the two countries, crossings increased again. The border gates have a capacity to process 3,000 people daily, who undergo comprehensive checks before traveling into Syria.
Türkiye expects more Syrians will return home soon, as Syrians working as seasonal laborers in fields and orchards across Türkiye, from Mersin and Antalya to Burdur and Isparta, return home.
The widespread destruction of basic infrastructure remains a major barrier to returns.
