Türkiye kicks off housing project to resettle refugees in northern Syria

Türkiye has launched the construction of nearly a quarter million housing units to resettle refugees in opposition-held northern Syria, Turkish media said, as repatriation efforts loom large in Türkiye's presidential runoff. An AFP correspondent on Wednesday saw builders working and heavy machinery being used at the side on the outskirts of the town of Al-Ghandura, in the Jarabulus area near the Turkish border. 'Syrian refugees living in Türkiye will settle in the houses... as part of a dignified, voluntary safe return,' Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu said Wednesday at the launch of the project, according to private Turkish news agency IHA. He said that '240,000 houses will be built' in the region, expressing hope that the project would be completed in three years, IHA added. Since Syria's war broke out in 2011, neighbouring Türkiye has taken in more than three million people who fled the fighting. The construction site Soylu visited was formerly an airstrip. On a billboard, 'Project for safe, voluntary and honourable returns' was written in Arabic and Turkish, while the names of organisations including Türkiye's relief agency AFAD and the Qatar Fund for Development featured on the sign. 'Qatari emir (Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad) Al-Thani and our President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have taken a big step toward addressing one of the world's most important issues,' Soylu said, according to the IHA report. 'To date, there have been 554,000 voluntary returns,' Soylu said. 'There is a serious demand for a voluntary and dignified return to this safe area.' Earlier this month, Erdoğan pledged to build some 200,000 homes in 13 locations in Syria, aiming to resettle some one million refugees, local media reported. In November, Soylu paid a visit to open 600 basic homes in Syria's opposition-held Idlib region, saying 75,000 houses had been constructed in the previous two years.