GENEVA (AP) — The civil war in Syria has forced over 2 million people out of the country and over 4 million others are displaced within its borders, making Syrians the nation with the largest number of people torn from their homes right now, U.N. officials said Tuesday.

If the conflict continues 3.5 million people Syrian refugees are expected by the end of the year, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said.

"At this particular moment it's the highest number of displaced people anywhere in the world," he told reporters in Geneva. "Syria has become the great tragedy of this century — a disgraceful humanitarian calamity with suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history."

Almost 5,000 citizens a day on average are flowing out of Syria — a country of some 23 million people — many of them with little more than the clothes they are wearing, Guterres said. The number of refugees has surged by 1.8 million in just 12 months — up from almost 231,000 a year ago.

"What is appalling is that the first million fled Syria during two years. The second million fled Syria in (the past) six months," he said of the impact of the civil war, which began as a rebellion against President Bashar Assad's regime in March 2011. "We have now almost one-third of the Syria population that has been displaced, and half in need of assistance."

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An aerial view shows the Zaatari refugee camp, near the Jordanian city of Mafraq in this July 18, 20 …

More than 97 per cent of Syria's refugees are hosted by countries in the immediate surrounding region, which is impacting their infrastructures, economies and societies and making them in need of urgent outside help, Guterres said.

"So there are no words to express the dimension of this tragedy," he said. "The only solace is the humanity shown by the neighboring countries in welcoming and saving the lives of so many refugees."

As of the end of August, the agency counted 716,000 refugees in Lebanon, 515,000 in Jordan, 460,000 in Turkey, 168,000 in Iraq and 110,000 in Egypt. It said over half of them were children.

That compares with Afghanistan's refugee crisis, whose numbers once rivaled Syria's, but has subsided somewhat with the repatriation of millions. Guterres noted that by comparison most Afghan refugees fled to two countries, Pakistan and Iran, each of which had populations far greater than the number of refugees they took in.

Guterres told reporters in Geneva that the U.N. refugee agency has now counted more than 2 million refugees who have fled Syria's violence. Another 4.25 million people have been displaced within Syria, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

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(Photo courtesy UNHCR/O. Laban-Mattei) A young Syrian refugee in her mobile home in the Zaatari's ca …

However, the UNCHR representative in Syria, Tarik Kurdi, said on Monday that around 5 million people were displaced inside Syria. Asked about the discrepancy, Guterres said the 4.25 million figure is the official U.N. count; the Syrian government has estimated there are 5.1 million people displaced within the country.

Ministers from Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey were planning to meet with Guterres on Wednesday in Geneva in an effort to gain greater international support.

"If the situation continues to deteriorate at this rate," said the U.N. special envoy for refugees, actress Angelina Jolie, "the number of refugees will only grow, and some neighboring countries could be brought to the point of collapse."

Obama urges prompt vote on Syria, Boehner signs on

Olivier Knox, Yahoo! News 2 hours ago

Kerry: Obama is 'not asking America to go to war'

Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday assured lawmakers wary of giving the green light to military strikes against Syria that President Barack Obama “is not asking America to go to war.”

Kerry warned lawmakers against embracing “armchair isolationism” or settling for being “spectators to slaughter” — and promised that any American action would be limited.

“Let me be clear: President Obama is not asking America to go to war,” the top U.S. diplomat told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

There will be no American ground troops in Syria, and Washington is not assuming responsibility for the country’s 2½-year-old civil war, he said. The conflict had left 100,000 people dead even before the alleged Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack by Bashar Assad’s forces, which Kerry said had killed about 1,400.

While Obama wants a congressional “authorization for the use of military force” — the same kind of document that set the stage for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq — and not a formal declaration of war, it seems unlikely that American observers would consider a Syrian missile on U.S. targets anything short of “war.”

Kerry, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Joints Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey faced a grilling by the committee about Obama’s Syria policy.

Kerry referred to the flawed case for war in Iraq, underlining that America’s intelligence agencies had “scrubbed” their reports on the alleged attack for any inaccuracies.

Obama and his top aides are mindful of “never again asking any member of Congress to take a vote on faulty intelligence,” the former senator said.

Kerry focused heavily on what he described as the risks of inaction, warning against giving Assad “impunity” that might embolden him to escalate attacks, or giving what amounts to a “permission slip” to countries like Iran or North Korea as well as extremist groups.

“They’re all listening for our silence,” Kerry said.

He did not spell out precisely how limited military action would achieve America’s goals without escalating the conflict or helping the extremist elements of rebel forces fighting to topple Assad.

But he dismissed the prospects that Assad could be so “arrogant” or “foolish” as to retaliate against American interests.

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Free Syrian Army fighters stand in front of buildings damaged by what activists said was shelling by …

“The United States and our allies have ample ways to make him regret that decision without going to war,” he said, without giving examples.

As Kerry wrapped up his testimony, “Code Pink” protester Medea Benjamin, dressed in her trademark color, began shouting “we don’t want another war” and “launching cruise missiles means another war.” Security escorted her out.

The hearing came amid profound doubts that the fractured Congress would easily give its approval in the face of stiff public opposition.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez, D-N.J., opened the hearing with a call to approve legislation authorizing what Obama has promised will be a limited military operation — not a repeat of Iraq or Afghanistan.

“This is not a declaration of war but a declaration of our values to the world,” Menendez, who voted against the war in Iraq, said in his opening statement.

“We are at a crossroads moment. A precedent will be set either for the unfettered and unpunished use of chemical weapons — or a precedent will be set for the deterrence of the use of such weapons through the limited use of military force,” he warned.

Even before the hearing got underway, a lone protester from the anti-war group "Code Pink" stood up clutching two small signs and calling out against war with Syria. Security escorted him from the room.

Gen. Dempsey could prove to be the most interesting witness: Two weeks ago, he wrote a letter warning Congress that striking Syria could escalate the U.S. role in the country’s civil war while helping opposition forces not friendly to the United States.

Earlier, Obama ramped up his parallel sales pitches for striking Syria, warning lawmakers that the standoff amounts to a dress rehearsal for a possible confrontation with Iran while assuring the U.S. public he won’t give them a rerun of Iraq or Afghanistan.

“The key point that I want to emphasize to the American people: The military plan that has been developed by the joint chiefs and that I believe is appropriate is proportional. It is limited. It does not involve boots on the ground,” Obama said as he hosted top lawmakers at the White House. “This is not Iraq and this is not Afghanistan.”

Obama also pushed Congress for a “prompt vote” of support for attacking Syria and signaled he would be OK with lawmakers imposing some limits on the mission.

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President Barack Obama talks with House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, prior to speaking to media, in …

“So long as we are accomplishing what needs to be accomplished, which is to send a clear message to Assad degrading his capabilities to use chemical weapons, not just now but also in the future — as long as the authorization allows us to do that, I’m confident that we’re going to be able to come up with something that hits that mark,” he said.

Republican House Speaker John Boehner, emerging from the meeting with Obama, said he would support legislation authorizing the use of force — but that it was up to the president to work for its passage. Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi echoed Boehner’s support, but said the White House still had to convince skeptical lawmakers.

The president did not mention Iran by name in his brief on-camera appearance Tuesday, but the implications were clear.

“This is a limited, proportional step that will send a clear message not only to the Assad regime, but also to other countries that may be interested in testing some of these international norms, that there are consequences,” he said.

Those “other countries” clearly include Syria’s patron Iran, which has been locked in a tense standoff with the United States and other world powers over its suspect nuclear program.

Failure to respond militarily to Syria’s alleged use of chemical weapons to massacre civilians “sends a message that international norms around issues like nuclear proliferation don't mean much,” Obama said.

The president said the United States must enforce international restrictions on chemical weapons in part because of the threat that the widening conflict in Syria poses to the stability of allies in the region.

“We recognize that there are certain weapons that, when used, cannot only end up resulting in grotesque deaths, but also can end up being transmitted to nonstate actors, can pose a risk to allies and friends of ours like Israel, like Jordan, like Turkey,” he said.

The point about Israel's security is sure to carry great weight in Congress, where few other issues enjoy greater bipartisan support.

But Obama does not have much time: Congress is expected to vote on an authorization as early as the week of Sept. 9, when most lawmakers return from their monthlong August break.

As lawmakers debated the issue, the nonpartisan Pew Research Center released a public opinion poll showing that 48 percent oppose military strikes against Syria, compared with 29 percent who support it.

And an ABC News/Washington Post survey found nearly 6 in 10 Americans oppose a unilateral U.S. military strike.

Earlier, the U.N.’s refugee agency said that more than 2 million Syrians had fled the country, up from 230,000 a year ago, adding to the strain for destination countries like U.S. allies Turkey and Jordan.

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Obama aides grilled by lawmakers on Syria

Despite growing bipartisan support for action against the Syrian government, the president faces stiff public opposition.
Watch live: Senate hearing

NEW DELHI (AP) — A series of recent high-profile gang rape cases in India has ignited a debate: Are such crimes on the rise, or is it simply that more attention is being paid to a problem long hidden within families and villages? The answer, experts say, is both.

Modernization is fueling a crisis of sexual assault in India, with increasingly independent women now working in factories and offices and stepping beyond the subservient roles to which they had traditionally been relegated. They are also more likely than their mothers and grandmothers were to report rapes, and more likely to encounter male strangers in public.

"We never used to see so many cases of gang rape, and so many involving groups of young, unemployed men," said Supreme Court lawyer Kirti Singh, who specializes in women's issues.

While there are no reliable statistics on gang rapes, experts say the trend, along with the growing sense of insecurity it has brought for women, led to recent outbursts of public anger over the long-ignored epidemic of violence against women.

The silence broke in December, when a New Delhi student was gang-raped on a bus in a particularly vicious attack from which she died two weeks later. A juvenile court on Saturday handed down the first conviction in the case, sending a teenager to a reform home for three years for rape and murder.

Protests in India over gang rapePlay video."

The sentence, the maximum a juvenile can face, was widely denounced as too lenient, and the girl's parents vowed to appeal. The other suspects in the case are being tried as adults and could face execution if convicted.

While attacks on women occur constantly across India, often within the home, the brutality and public nature of the New Delhi case left many shocked and shamed. Thousands took to the streets in the capital to express their outrage.

The government, pledging to crack down, created fast-track courts for rape cases, doubled prison terms for rape and criminalized voyeurism, stalking, acid attacks and the trafficking of women.

The Tourism Ministry launched a nationwide "I Respect Women" campaign after a Swiss bicyclist was gang-raped in March in central India and an American woman was gang-raped two months later in the northern resort town of Manali.

Yet another high-profile gang rape last month, against a photojournalist on assignment in Mumbai, renewed public fury and sent the media into 24-7 coverage marked by daily front page headlines and talk shows debating how to make India safe for women.

Gang rape of young photojournalist shocks MumbaiPlay video."

"There is very clearly a class dimension" that is compounding the sudden outrage, women's rights lawyer Flavia Agnes said.

All five of the accused in the Mumbai attack had little to no education, and three had previously been arrested for theft, Mumbai police said. They lived in the slums near the abandoned textile mill where the woman was raped.

In both the Mumbai and the Delhi cases, "middle-class people identified with these young girls, aspiring professionals, trying to make their mark in a competitive world," said Sudha Sundararaman, an activist with the All India Democratic Women's Association.

Experts say the rapid growth of India's cities and the yawning gulf between rich and poor are exacerbating the problem, with young men struggling to prove their traditional dominance in a changing world.

"These are young men in the cities, without prospects, without hope. They feel rage against those who are perceived to have it," sociologist Sudhir Kakar said.

Raw: Protest As India Rape Suspects Go to CourtPlay video."

Cultural stigmas, police apathy and judicial incompetence have long made it difficult for women to even report rapes.

But if modernization is changing the risks women face, it is also giving them the ability to speak up. In the first three months after the December bus rape, the number of rapes reported in the city more than doubled to 359, from the 143 reported in January-March of 2012.

Those numbers, in a city of almost 17 million people, are still seen by experts as far below the actual number of attacks, but the jarring increase in just one year appeared to signal a significant change.

"The biggest change is that women in the middle classes are reporting crimes to police," Kakar said. They are fed up with the landscape of sexual harassment and fear, with the constant barrage of lewd comments and even groping — locally known as "eve-teasing" — and with being told they should stay indoors at night.

"Thirty years ago, even uttering the word 'rape' was almost taboo. That is changing," said Ranjana Kumari, a women's activist with the Center for Social Research. "There are so many cases, each more gruesome than the other, and people have lost patience, especially when no justice is served."

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FILE - In this Saturday, Aug. 24, 2013 file photo, photojournalists sit with placards during a prote …

The photojournalist attacked last month stunned the nation by telling local media that "rape is not the end of life" — a groundbreaking statement given that many rape victims are still often dismissed as defiled. Many are shunned by their families, fired from jobs or driven from their home villages. As a result, most rape victims are still thought to remain silent.

"What's wrong with the system?" Supreme Court Justices R.M. Lodha and Madan B. Lokur said in a statement last week, while hearing a petition from the father of a 15-year-old girl gang-raped by three men in 2012, according to Indian media. The girl, who is a dalit, member of the outcast community once known as untouchables, has since been barred from her school in north India, and her mother was killed for refusing to withdraw a police complaint about the crime, according to Press Trust of India.

The court lambasted India's poor record of conviction in rape cases, saying "Why are 90 percent of rape cases ending in acquittals? The situation is going from bad to worse."

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BEIRUT (AP) — As the Obama administration tries to prod Congress into backing armed action against Syria, the regime in Damascus is hiding military hardware and shifting troops out of bases into civilian areas.

Politically, President Bashar Assad has gone on the offensive, warning in a rare interview with Western media that any military action against Syria could spark a regional war.

If the U.S. undertakes missile strikes, Assad's reaction could have a major effect on the trajectory of Syria's civil war. Neighboring countries could get dragged into a wider conflict, or it could be back to business as usual for a crisis that has claimed the lives of more than 100,000 people over 2½ years.

The main Western-backed opposition group says that during the buildup last week to what seemed like an imminent U.S. attack, the army moved troops as well as rocket launchers, artillery and other heavy weapons into residential neighborhoods in cities nationwide. Three Damascus residents, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, confirmed such movements.

One man said two members of the elite Republican Guards broke into an empty house he owns and showed him an official document stating they were authorized to do so because Syria is at war. A woman in another area said soldiers moved into a school next to her house.

A U.S. official confirmed there are indications that the Syrian regime is taking steps to move some of its military equipment and bolster protection for defense facilities.

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Syria braces for tough response from West. (Produced by Gordon Donovan/Yahoo News)

The official, who was not authorized to discuss intelligence matters and spoke on condition of anonymity, said that at this point, the U.S. has the information it needs to maintain a good handle on what the regime is doing to prepare.

The trend inside Syria is likely to continue in the coming days now that the regime has won a reprieve with President Barack Obama's decision to seek congressional approval for military action.

"The Syrian regime knows there are 30-40 potential targets for U.S. airstrikes, and they have had ample time to prepare," said Hisham Jaber, a retired Lebanese army general and director of the Middle East Center for Studies and Political Research in Beirut. "Half of them, if not more, have been evacuated, moved or camouflaged. This is the natural thing to do."

Obama said last week that he believes the U.S. should strike Syria for what the administration says was a deadly chemical weapons attack by Assad's forces on rebel-held suburbs of Damascus. The administration has stressed, however, that any operation would be limited and not aimed at tipping the balance of power in Syria's civil war.

In an interview published Monday with the French newspaper Le Figaro, Assad refused to say how Syria would respond to Western strikes, but warned that "the risk of a regional war exists."

The regime has a range of options if the U.S. does bomb. It could retaliate with rockets against U.S. allies in the region. It could unleash allies like Hezbollah against Western targets abroad. Or it could do nothing — and score propaganda points by portraying itself as victim of U.S. aggression.

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Fighters from the Free Syrian Army's Tahrir al Sham brigade use a shotgun to fire an improvised gren …

The regime's choice, analysts say, will probably depend on the magnitude of the American military action: The bigger and more sustained the strikes, the more likely the government in Damascus will feel compelled to respond.

If Washington follows through with calibrated strikes, analysts say, Assad may reach for a political card, not a military one.

"His first option is propaganda value," said Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center. Assad could try to foster the notion "that the West is again attacking a Middle Eastern state, an Arab state, without the right international legitimacy. And he can bolster that dynamic, that narrative, by showing that it's had a cost on innocent civilians."

One way to achieve that would be to show the world images of civilians purportedly killed by American strikes.

"If he's able to score points from this, he will feel that he's actually won without actually engaging in a military response," Shaikh said.

Assad charted a similar course after Israeli airstrikes in May that targeted advanced weapons destined for Lebanon's Shiite militant group Hezbollah. His regime portrayed the attacks as proof of the rebels' collusion with Israel, denounced the strikes as a violation of Syrian sovereignty and dispatched an obscure militant group to threaten retaliation.

President Assad Fires Back at the United StatesPlay video."

In terms of military responses, Assad could launch rockets at U.S. allies Turkey, Jordan or Israel. But that could touch off a prolonged military engagement with an outside power at a time when the regime is already in a bloody fight for its survival.

An attack against NATO-member Turkey could trigger a response from the entire military alliance, while Jordan hosts about a dozen U.S. F-16 jets, a Patriot missile battery and around 1,000 American troops.

As for Israel, the Assad regime could launch rockets at the Jewish state, or turn to Hezbollah to do so. The militant group, which fought Israel to a standstill in a 34-day war in 2006, is believed to have a well-stocked arsenal of missiles capable of hitting the country's major cities.

But analysts say Syria is unlikely to pursue such a course unless the U.S. strikes pose an immediate threat to Assad's grip on power.

Hezbollah would have a lot to lose. The group is already facing flak at home for fighting alongside Syrian government troops against the rebels. A full-on confrontation with Israel on behalf of Syria would probably be a tough sell to its Shiite constituents at home, let alone the broader Lebanese public.

"I can't see a situation whereby they would accept an order from Assad to, say, attack Israel or attack some domestic enemies. I think that would be too damaging for their position," said Chris Phillips, a Syria specialist at Queen Mary University in London.

Obama Says He's Ready For Military Action In SyriaPlay video."

Israeli defense officials also say the odds of retaliation by Syria or Hezbollah are very low. Still, Israel has deployed Iron Dome anti-missile batteries in the Tel Aviv area and toward its northern frontier with Syria.

Between these two extremes lies a middle path for Assad, which would involve an attack such as a car bombing carried out by a sympathetic militant group.

"Something to indicate to the outside world that it's dangerous to mess with the Assad regime, that they have levers that can cause damage elsewhere, while also plausibly denying that they've had direct impact," Phillips said.

As an example, Phillips pointed to a double car bombing earlier this year in Turkey that killed more than 50 people. Turkey blames Syria, while Syria denies any role.

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Associated Press writer Lolita C. Baldor in Washington contributed to this story.

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Follow Ryan Lucas on Twitter at www.twitter.com/relucasz

Syria believed to be hiding weapons, moving troops