Expanding Protection Options? Flexible Approaches to Status for Displaced Syrians, Venezuelans, and Ukrainians

First, domestic support for welcoming Syrians to Turkey was high, partly because of narratives of Islamic solidarity, widespread sympathy for the victims of conflict, the government’s opposition to the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, and the perception that Syrians would eventually return to Syria.14 Second, the Turkish government received diplomatic and humanitarian support from international. [...] Following implementation of the TPR and shifting away from the initial humanitarian approach, the Turkish government moved to increase the socioeconomic inclusion of Syrians, which would help increase Syrians’ self-reliance and the sustainability of the response. [...] A survey conducted by the German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees between August and October 2022 found that 37 percent of Ukrainians would like to stay in Germany permanently or for several years, 34 percent planned to stay just until the end of the war, and 27 percent were undecided.95 Diplomatic relations between Ukraine and the European Union further complicate the picture. [...] In Turkey, the laws in place at the beginning of the Syrian crisis did not account for non-European refugees, and as a result, only 19,000 refugees were registered prior to the Syrian conflict.101 The country did not have updated asylum procedures, and UNHCR handled the processing and registration of all other protection seekers. [...] Calculating the Costs and Benefits of a Temporary Approach By and large, the approaches used to respond to the Syrian, Ukrainian, and Venezuelan displacement crises accomplished their initial goals of providing at least temporary legal status and orderly reception processes and were useful tools in managing a challenging situation.