Hillary Clinton: Syrian Refugee Crisis Is A 'Global Crisis'

"The entire world now sees [it] doesn't just affect the Syrian people; it affects all of us."

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that the United States should help to address the Syrian refugee crisis, but added that a much larger global response was needed to resolve the issue.

MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell asked Clinton, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for president, whether the U.S. should raise its quota for Syrian refugees.

"We should do our part, as should the Europeans; but this is a broader, global crisis," Clinton replied. "We now have more refugees than we've had in many years -- I think, since the Second World War."

The crisis has displaced more than 4.1 million Syrians, and the U.S. has announced that it will accept 8,000 refugees in 2016.

Calling the crisis "heartbreaking," Clinton said that the issue was one that "the entire world now sees doesn't just affect the Syrian people; it affects all of us. That's what I've been saying for years."

Clinton also said she supported doing more to arm moderate Syrian rebels early on in their fight against Syrian President Bashar Assad, a position that President Barack Obama disagreed with. Asked whether Obama's foreign policy caused the crisis, Clinton said that "the world's policies" were responsible.

"I advocated for -- as I say -- a more robust policy. But sitting here today, I can't say that would have, on its own, made a difference, because this had to be an international effort," she said.

In an interview with The Huffington Post on Thursday, Secretary of State John Kerry said that the U.S. could "do a lot more to protect" Syrian refugees and would work with existing refugee camps in other countries.

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