Thanks for having me today.
I just want to give you a little bit of background on what's happening in Syria.
I'm going to start off with some statistics, and the statistics I'm going to read out to you are of documented people. These are people who have been identified, not people who are missing or who have not been identified. The statistics are a little bit skewed in that way.
As of yesterday morning, recorded by the Center for Documentation of Violations in Syria, there were 30,273 deaths. Deaths of children: there were 2,020 males and 848 females; and there were 26,383 civilian deaths.
I also want to talk a little bit about the detainees. The number of revolutionary detainees is 31,763 thus far. This might come as a surprise to you, but there are children who are also being detained by Syrian officials. The number of males is 768; females, 24.
The latest reports, according to Human Rights Watch, claim that Assad is using cluster bombs on his people. Furthermore, since this report has surfaced, Human Rights Watch in Syria claims that regime forces have revved up their use of cluster bombs and are using them in civilian areas only. On Monday, in six areas in four separate provinces, cluster bombs were used. The bombs, again, targeted only civilian areas, where none are controlled by the Free Syrian Army. Furthermore, the Syrian regime is fully accountable for the use of these internationally prohibited weapons, which seem to be systematically used in Syria. The regime is violating basic United Nations principles and laws.
Assad's offensives on his citizens are claiming on average 150 people a day. On October 17—that's yesterday—155 people were killed. On October 16, 133 people were killed. On October 15, 100 people were killed. You get the idea here, and this is just in the past few days. The latest report is that regime forces are using barrel bombs in civilian areas, specifically on schools, killing most of the children inside. The barrel bombs are, again, not in Free Syrian Army stronghold areas, but are targeting children specifically.
Torture has been reported in every city and town, and down to every family. I don't want to get into the chilling details of what goes on, but I'll share with you one story that just sends chills down my spine. Women are being systematically raped in Syria, not by one, two, or three of the militia men, but by many people. After the militia men are finished raping the victim, they insert a live mouse or rat in her vagina to destroy any sense of dignity that might have been left for this woman.
Children are not only dying by the hands of the regime's brutality, but by malnourishment, as food and water are becoming increasingly scarce. Food costs in Syria have gone up six times the price of what they were before the revolution. A loaf of bread is becoming increasingly unaffordable, and families are going without food at times. Babies are dying as mothers are not able to breastfeed them because of the lack of nutrition for the mothers, and the mothers have gone dry. There's no formula or clean water to prepare formula in some areas, mainly Homs. In many cases, it is a state of total disaster.
People's homes have been completely destroyed and entire streets, and in some cases cities are empty now because of the fighting—cities like Homs, Idlib, Zabadani, and Aleppo. Nothing at all is sacred. The regime destroys anything. UNESCO heritage sites, as some of you might know, have been destroyed in Assad's quest to remain the president of this country.
The images and stories are chilling and hard to forget, but they have become common for us who are involved in the revolution. My grandfather just got back from Syria two weeks ago. He's 90 years old. He and I sat and talked about some of the things that were going on in Syria, and both of us were crying like babies by the end of it. He's broken. It's actually difficult to see your grandfather like that, and to see him at the end of his days seeing a country that he loved so much being completely ruined. That's what's going on inside Syria.
I'll talk a little bit about what's happening on the ground in the refugee camps. According to the UNHCR, there are about 261,114 recognized refugees. The numbers within the refugee camps are fluid. Turkey has 96,000, Jordan has 58,000, Lebanon has 65,000, Iraq has 40,000 people. There are over 50,000 Syrians waiting at the borders to be admitted into other countries, but they cannot leave because they are undocumented.
Jordan's figures are not accurate because people are drifting in and out of the camps. In Lebanon the numbers aren't accurate because a lot of the bordering towns in Lebanon are absorbing a lot of refugees, so they're not accounted for. The number in Lebanon is closer to 100,000.
There are also makeshift refugee sites at the border of Jordan and Syria where 10,000 people live in absolute squalor. I saw a picture the other day of three little babies covered in flies, no diapers, shirts dirty, drinking God knows what, eating God knows what. It's hard to imagine. These people are not allowed to get through to Jordan as they're undocumented and don't have the proper papers to cross.
The most important objective at this point, and what the Turkish representative was speaking about before, is that the winter is coming. We're trying to get enough clothes and warm blankets for the people to survive the winter in the refugee camps. A lot of the American and Canadian groups who support the Syrian refugees are focusing on getting the blankets and warm clothing to the camps, but food is also very limited; it's scarce.
One very disappointing and horrible story that's coming out of the Zaatari camps in Jordan is that there are reports of young women being sold, young girls actually, for the equivalent of $20 Canadian, to be wives for older men. This was happening online. It's incredible. It wasn't stopped early on, so a lot of girls were sold off. A lot of these girls don't have fathers, as they've died in the civil war and this war, or they were fighting.
Other refugees are going into Egypt. They're not, of course, recognized by the United Nations. There are no official refugee camps in Egypt, but there are people who are trying to absorb them as well.
I was speaking to a representative a couple of days ago and she says things are looking grim. People have come with very little money, very little food, nothing, and are trying to get jobs in Egypt. In Egypt, a job is actually hard to come by to begin with. Supplies are short and winter is coming.
On the ground, between the militarization and peacefulness, the grassroots movements are still fighting for freedom, which started in the streets of Syria. This Syrian fight for freedom adds a new chapter to enrich the history of humanity, a unique chapter like no other, so colourful with slogans of freedom and dignity, and these are the people who are protesting on the ground. With all of this, you still have people going out and protesting for their freedom.
For the past 19 months, Syrians continue to take to the streets, despite the desperate attempts of the regime to crush and repress these peaceful demonstrations by shelling civilians with its warplanes. But Syrians insist on continuing their eternal fight for freedom and survival, to build a future full of hope and victory, to say tomorrow is ours, through 405 demonstrations that the local coordinating committee documented last Friday, on October 12.
With all of what we've heard, the people of Syria are still fighting for their freedom, and we need to help them get there.
I'm going to stop now and defer to Faisal at this point. If there is any more time, I can finish what I want to say.