US Secretary of State John Kerry stated that “the root cause of this [refugee] crisis, and … the principal impetus for this mass exodus of human beings is the utter brutality of the Assad regime and the absence of any sense of hope or possibility of a safe future that people now feel after these years of conflict in Syria.”
Khatib Badla, member of the political committee, said that Syrians began to flee Syria even before the emergence of ISIS, and nearly half the Syrian people are now internally displaced and living in refugee camps. They began to flee their homes after Assad declared war on them using all weapons at his disposal, from knives to chemical weapons and barrel bombs.”
Vice-president Mustafa Osso said that “we did not expect the governments of Europe nor any friendly government to increase their share of Syrian refugees, which plays into the hands of the Assad and Iranian regimes who seek to displace as many Syrians as they can and bring about demographic change in Syria. Syrians want Assad to be toppled rather emptying Syria in favor of the Iranian mercenaries brought fighting alongside the Assad regime. (Source: Syrian Coalition)