SYRIAN President Bashar al-Assad has warned Western powers that the refugee crisis is the result of their support for terrorists fighting his government.

In an interview with Russia Today broadcast yesterday, Mr Assad accused Europe of “double standards” and said that his government’s priority was the fight against terrorism.

He denounced EU leaders for providing “protection for terrorists, calling them moderates, (for) dividing them into groups, when they are in fact the terrorist groups in Syria.