females age 16-49: 4,966,367 (2008 est.)

Manpower fit for military service:

males age 16-49: 4,242,401
females age 16-49: 4,218,648 (2008 est.)

Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually:

male: 215,734
female: 203,106 (2008 est.)

Military expenditures:

5.9% of GDP (2005 est.)

Transnational Issues
Syria

Disputes - international:

Golan Heights is Israeli-occupied with the almost 1,000-strong UN
Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) patrolling a buffer zone since
1964; lacking a treaty or other documentation describing the
boundary, portions of the Lebanon-Syria boundary are unclear with
several sections in dispute; since 2000, Lebanon has claimed Shaba'a
farms in the Golan Heights; 2004 Agreement and pending demarcation
settles border dispute with Jordan; approximately two million Iraqis
have fled the conflict in Iraq with the majority taking refuge in
Syria and Jordan

Refugees and internally displaced persons:

refugees (country of origin): 1-1.4 million (Iraq); 522,100
(Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA))
IDPs: 305,000 (most displaced from Golan Heights during 1967
Arab-Israeli War) (2007)

Trafficking in persons:

current situation: Syria is a destination and transit country for
women and children trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation and
forced labor; a significant number of women and children in the
large and expanding Iraqi refugee community in Syria are reportedly
forced into commercial sexual exploitation by Iraqi gangs or, in
some cases, their families; women from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the
Philippines, Ethiopia, and Sierra Leone are recruited for work in
Syria as domestic servants, but some face conditions of involuntary
servitude, including long hours, non-payment of wages, withholding
of passports, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical or
sexual abuse
tier rating: Tier 3 - Syria again failed to report any law
enforcement efforts to punish trafficking offenses in 2007; in
addition, the government did not offer protection services to
victims of trafficking and may have arrested, prosecuted, or
deported some victims for prostitution or immigration violations;
Syria has not ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol (2008)

Illicit drugs:

a transit point for opiates, hashish, and cocaine bound for regional
and Western markets; weak anti-money-laundering controls and bank
privatization may leave it vulnerable to money laundering

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