On Tuesday, the World Bank announced that it will supply Jordan with "substantial funds" to help the country cope with the huge influx of Syrian refugees that it has been receiving since the start of the conflict.
Since the onset of violence in 2011, roughly 1.5 million Syrian refugees have left their war-torn country and it is estimated that just over a third fled to neighboring Jordan. The UN estimates that the number of displaced Syrians in the Hashemite Kingdom will exceed 1.2 million.
The plans to provide Jordan with this aid was announced by President Jim Yong Kim, who said "there will be significant amounts of new funding going to Jordan in the very near future to deal with the crisis," speaking after a conference at the UN World Health Assembly in Geneva, according to Reuters.
Speaking on the escalating violence being seen within Syria's borders, Kim said that he was concerned about regional developments and that the World Bank was ready to assist those in need.
According to Reuters, in 2012 Jordan received a pledge of $250 million from the World Bank in order to help combat the burdens that the Syrian crisis was having on its already struggling economy. Jordan asked Kim for additional aid two weeks ago.
“With Jordan, they are the first ones who have come and just asked me directly for increased assistance and we’ve said yes,” Kim said, Reuters reported.
“So we are using all of our flexibilities to try to increase our lending to them at very low rates so they will be able to respond to the humanitarian crisis.”
