Watch | UN calls Syria ‘largest displacement crisis in modern times’

The United Nations has said the fighting and violence in Syria has created “one of the largest displacement crises of modern times.” An estimated 13.5 million people in Syria are now in need of humanitarian assistance and some form of protection, including more than six million children.

U.N. humanitarian chief Stephen O'Brien told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that this represents an increase of some 1.2 million people in just 10 months.

O'Brien said there are now some 6.5 million people who have fled their homes and are displaced inside Syria while 4.2 million have fled the country.

He said rising levels of fighting and violence over the last few weeks have had “an enormous humanitarian impact” resulting in large-scale death, injury and displacement of civilians.