UN admits aid failure for Syria as quake death toll rises

UN admits aid failure for Syria as quake death toll rises

Damascus, The Gulf Observer: The United Nations (UN) has decried the failure to ship desperately needed aid to war-torn regions of Syria, while warning the death toll from last week’s earthquake is set to rise far higher.

A UN convoy with supplies for northwest Syria arrived via Türkiye, but the agency’s relief chief Martin Griffiths said on Sunday much more was needed for millions whose homes were destroyed.

Supplies have been slow to arrive in Syria, where years of conflict have ravaged the healthcare system, and parts of the country remain under the control of rebels battling the government of President Bashar al Assad, which is under Western sanctions.

But a 10-truck UN convoy crossed into northwest Syria via the Bab al Hawa border crossing, according to an AFP correspondent, carrying shelter kits, plastic sheeting, rope, blankets, mattresses and carpets.

Bab al Hawa is the only point for international aid to reach people in rebel-held areas of Syria after nearly 12 years of civil war, after other crossings were closed under pressure from China and Russia.

The head of the World Health Organization met Assad in Damascus on Sunday and said the Syrian leader had voiced readiness for more border crossings to help bring aid into the rebel-held northwest.

“He was open to considering additional cross-border access points for this emergency,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters.

Conflict, Covid, cholera, quake

“The compounding crises of conflict, Covid, cholera, economic decline and now the earthquake have taken an unbearable toll,” Tedros said a day after visiting Aleppo.

He added that he was “waiting to move across lines to the northwest, where we’ve been told the impact is even worse”.

But while Damascus had given the all-clear for cross-line aid convoys to go ahead from government areas, Tedros said the WHO was still waiting for a green light from rebel-held areas before going in.

Assad looked forward to further “efficient cooperation” with the UN agency to improve the shortage in supplies, equipment and medicines, his presidency said.

He had also thanked the United Arab Emirates for providing “huge relief and humanitarian aid”, with pledges of tens of millions of dollars.

Syria’s transport ministry said 62 aid planes had landed in Syria this week with more on the way from Saudi Arabia.

Jordan’s foreign ministry announced the country’s air force had flown the first two planeloads of 480 UN tents to Syria and Türkiye “out of 10,000 tents that will be transported” to the two countries.

Officials and medics said 29,605 people had died in Turkey and 3,581 in Syria from Monday’s 7.7-magnitude quake, bringing the confirmed total to 33,186.