Sun readers donate £1.2m to help child refugees in For Aylan appeal

The Sun’s For Aylan campaign set up to raise money for orphans from war-torn countries has raised at least £1.2m.

The paper launched the campaign last Friday, the day after Aylan Kurdi was pictured drowned on a Turkish beach on newspaper front pages.

On its first day, The Sun said readers donated £350,000. Today, the paper said Sun readers had now donated £1.2million.

The donations, which are made to the Save the Children’s Child Refugee Crisis Appeal, will help child refugees arriving in Greece and Italy from war-torn countries.

The paper is also asking the UK Government to let 3,000 Syrian orphans be fostered in the UK.

A Save The Children spokesperson said today: “The support of the Sun newspaper and their readers for our Child Refugee Appeal has been extraordinary. On the first day that the appeal for donations was on the Sun front page we raised over £500,000. Traffic on our phone lines doubled and online activity surged 50-fold.

“In the days that followed, and after ongoing support from the Sun, the generosity of the British people has continued. The total raised for the appeal now stands at £1.5million, and it is still going up. The much needed money will fund our work with the most vulnerable refugees, children fleeing war and making long and perilous journeys to seek safety. We cannot thank The Sun readers and all our other donors enough for their support. We hope people continue to give so we can reach more children who desperately need our help.”