Gordon Brown called for governments, business and charitable foundations to provide the money to put every Syrian refugee child in school, as he warned that the greatest humanitarian disaster since the second world war risked creating a lost generation.
The former British prime minister, now the UN special envoy for education, told the Davos economic summit that the current market turmoil should not be used as an excuse for inaction.
He said: “Whatever the difficulties in financial markets and whatever difficulties countries have with their individual aid budgets, we have to come together in the face of this great humanitarian crisis.”
Brown, who praised the Guardian for its Christmas appeal for refugees which raised more than £2m, said there were now 60 million displaced people around the world, 20 million of them refugees. “Syria is at the epicentre with the fastest growing problem – 12 million displaced persons, 4 million of them refugees, 2 million of them children.”
The former prime minister said that within a year the number of Syrian refugee children would swell to close to 2.5 million, and that $750m (£530m) was needed to fund an extra 1m school places.
He added that $500m had already been raised from a variety of sources, including the EU and the World Bank, but an additional $250m was needed by 4 February, when the UK will host an international conference on the refugee crisis in London. “Without action now, these young Syrians will become a lost generation.”
Brown added that young Syrians had to be given hope. “There is no solution to the exodus to Europe without an expansion of education.”
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