Syria should remind us "we are all neighbors", Germany says

The humanitarian catastrophe in Syria should remind us that "we are all neighbors," the German minister for foreign affairs, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, told the United Nations General Assembly here Thursday.

"Let me stress that when dealing with a humanitarian catastrophe as horrifying as the one in Syria -- we are all neighbors," said Steinmeier, "That is what we must all remind ourselves of, and crawl out of our diplomatic trenches."

"There will not be a military solution," Steinmeier said, "and neither supposed eternal truths nor national interests must be allowed to obstruct an effort to take the first steps towards defusing the conflict."

Steinmeier said that Germany has so far accepted 600,000 refugees since the start of the year, but that with 10,000 new refugees arriving every day it would not be able to shoulder this alone in the long term.

He added that addressing the refugee crisis also involved providing support to the countries neighbouring Syria who have taken the majority of refugees, adding that Germany had met with other countries on Tuesday to raise 1.8 billion dollars for UN relief agencies.

These funds, he said, would help "relieve the burden on the neighbouring countries in which the huge majority of refugees arrive -- especially Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan."

"They too need our help so that one exodus does not trigger another," said Steinmeier.

The Syrian crisis, which broke out in March 2011, led to a massive refugee influx into Syria's neigboring countries, such as Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. Enditem