Turkey Says 25 Thousand Syrians Have Returned Since Assad Regime Collapsed

Residents lived in a shelter in northeastern Syria in mid-December 2024. (X @UNHCRINSYRIA)

JAKARTA - More than 25,000 Syrians have returned home from Turkey since Bashar Assad was ousted by the HTS rebel group.

"The number of people returning to Syria in the past 15 days has surpassed 25,000," Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya told Anadolu's official news agency, Tuesday, December 24.

Turkey is known to be an area for nearly three million Syrian refugees who fled since the civil war broke out in 2011. The existence of the refugees is a problem in itself for the Government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkey is currently coordinating with new Syrian leaders to focus on repatriating the Syrian refugees.

Erdogan's government hopes that the change of power in Syria will allow many of the refugees to return home.

Yerylikaya said the migration office would be established at Turkish embassies and consulates in Damascus and Aleppo so that records of returning Syrian citizens could be recorded.

Turkey, which has closed its embassies in Syria since the civil war in the country concluded that it had reopened its diplomatic office in Damasku a week after Assad was ousted.