Where More Than 5.5 Million Syrian Refugees Go
There were approximately 17 million refugees in 2016, the highest number ever recorded by the United Nations.
Refugees come from everywhere around the world. It's an issue that is pertinent on every continent, and to a certain extent, every country.
Most refugees, though, come from Syria.
Syria has been at war since March 15th 2011 causing more than 5.5 million to flee the country in search for security. It has more than double the number of refugees from Afghanistan, which has the second most refugees, with just over 2.5 million, and encompasses 32% of the total refugees around the world in 2016.
Even, though,
Donald Trump is concerned about the number of Syrian refugees coming into the US, and has put Syria on a travel ban, few Syrian refugees go to the US, at least when you put it into context. Most Syrian refugees don't go very far when they escape. Their main destinations are Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Germany, Iraq, and Egypt.
Main destinations for Syrian refugees
Countries with more than 1000 Syrian refugees
Just under 3 million of all Syrian refugees escaped to Turkey, which took in more Syrian refugees than any other country in 2016.
Many of these countries, especially the neighbouring countries, Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan have
struggled to cope with one of the largest exoduses in recent history.
To compound the problem, the Syrian refugee crisis has happen in a relatively short period of time.
Trend of refugees by top 15 countries of origin
In 2011 there were "only" around 20 thousand Syrian refugees. From 2011 to 2016, there has been a 27,617% increase in Syrian refugees. It's the most precipitous rise in refugees since the United Nations started recording refugee data.
Notes
The cleaning, and analysis was all done in Python.
I used D3.js to create the charts. I used HTML, and CSS, to build the page layout.