What would you risk your life for?

The images of people jumping from a boat into the Mediterranean as the vessel capsizes is a reminder that hundreds of thousands of people will put their lives on the line to try and reach Europe.

Getting here is something so important to their future that they are prepared to risk death.

Around 500 migrants were on board the boat which overturned

Its humbling to think that the vast majority of us had the blessing of being born in a country that enjoys peace and wealth. Every parent will hope their children never face situations so desperate that they have to climb into an overloaded boat in pursuit of sanctuary and a livelihood.

Yes, the people smugglers who profit from their peril are odious. It’s estimated that on one stretch of the Libyan coast people smuggling now accounts for up to half of GDP.

But what compels people to put their lives in the hands of rogues? War, poverty, extremism, hunger and oppression – that and the hope of a better life – are sending people on a journey fraught with dangers.

People are helped to board an Italian Navy ship after the capsize

The latest asylum figures show the number of claims in the UK (34,687 in the year to March) has gone up by 38% on the previous year and reached the highest level for more than a decade.

It might come as surprise that only 2,539 applications came from people from Syria. Many more came from nationals of Iran (4,305), Eritrea (3,321), Iraq (2,805), Sudan (2,769) and Pakistan (2,669).

There has been an increase in the number of lone children looking for refuge in the UK. Unaccompanied children made 3,206 asylum applications, a jump of 57% on the previous year.

But Britain’s experience of the migrant crisis is nothing like that of other EU countries. The country has just the ninth highest number of asylum applications.

A boy pushes a stroller with a child at the migrants camp in Idomeni, Greece. Thousands of stranded refugees and migrants have camped in Idomeni for months since the border was closed

Look at the situation in Germany (562,000), Sweden (159,000) and Hungary (142,000).

Syria is the home country of the largest number of refugees at an EU level, followed by Afghanistan, Iraq, Kosovo, Albania, Pakistan, Eritrea, Nigeria, Iran and Ukraine.

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Syrians have fled both the forces of a brutal dictator and the extremism of groups such as the so-called Islamic State. But there is little doubt that much more could have been done to help the refugees who poured across its borders.

The website of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees shows that funding requirements of £3.1bn were identified this year but a mere £679m has been received to date.

A group who entered Macedonia from Greece illegally walk between the two lines of the protective fence along the border line

To put this in perspective, the Welsh Government receives roughly £15bn from the UK Treasury to meet the needs of the 3.1 million of us living in Wales. That’s not including the cash that goes into paying pensions and other benefits, or the cost of running the armed forces.

But there are 4.8 million Syrian refugees who need to find shelter, livelihood and education.

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If the so-called international community had done more to provide fleeing families with safety and the hope of a future an emergency might not have spiralled into a crisis.

Yes, rich European countries face a challenge accommodating refugees but consider the situation faced by Syria’s neighbours, all of which have their own internal problems.

Children from a refugee camp in the Zahle Valley in Lebanon, on the border with Syria

More than a million are in Lebanon, a country with a national population of just 4.1 million. There are 2.7 million “persons of concern” in Turkey.

Refugees have refused to surrender to terror and despair and daily demonstrate extraordinary courage in their struggle to survive. The least we can do is give them respect.