UN Security Council extends cross-border aid delivery in Syria for another six months

Oxfam Intermón sees the measure as “disappointing” and asks to guarantee support for these resolutions “beyond January 2023”

12 (EUROPE PRESS)

The United Nations Security Council agreed on Tuesday to extend the cross-border delivery of humanitarian aid from Turkey to the northwestern region of Syria by another six months, a program that expired on Sunday.

The resolution, which was drafted by Ireland and Norway, has finally been adopted after Russia – which had voted against it over the weekend – gave the document its go-ahead. Initially, however, the text advocated extending the cross-border delivery of assistance to the country, which has been at war for eleven years, for one year.

Now, after days of blockade, the Security Council has managed to approve the measure, which allows aid to be delivered to millions of people in Syria. For Russia, which has conditioned the extension to only six months, it is a “solution to break the ‘impasse'” and leaves the door open to another possible extension.

The text has run into the abstention of countries such as the United States, France and the United Kingdom, which called for a resolution that would provide an automatic extension of another six months after half a year had elapsed.

In addition, the resolution urges the UN Secretary General to make a special report on the humanitarian situation in the country. The aid is usually distributed from Turkey to the Syrian region of Idlib, and cross-border delivery was first established in 2014.

The Russian government, however, has advocated on several occasions to close Bab al Hawa, the last of the four humanitarian border crossings that had once been open to facilitate the distribution of aid.

In the event that the mandate was not resumed, the UN could only have delivered this aid through the Syrian government itself, something that has been criticized by the international community, considering that this could strengthen the position of the president, Bashar Al Assad. , compared to its rivals.

The UN Secretary General, António Guterres, has insisted that this aid is “essential” for the population of Idlib, as the organization has collected in a statement. “It’s a matter of life or death for a lot of them,” he has said.

However, he recalled that the UN “requested a one-year renewal.” “The Security Council has approved another six months, but I really hope that after this period of time the mandate will be renewed again,” she asserted.

For its part, the NGO Oxfam Intermón has pointed out that the decision to renew the mandate for only six months is “disappointing” and has warned that “it could leave more than four million people in northwestern Syria without aid from which depend on to survive the harsh winters.

The head of the organization’s office in New York, Brenda Mofya, said in a statement that “it is an unsustainable process that adds more uncertainty to an already precarious situation for vulnerable Syrians.” “If the Council lets this happen again, humanitarian agencies will not be able to deliver crucial assistance such as food, water or medicine,” she added.

Mofya has emphasized that six months “does not constitute a sufficient period of time to put on the table alternative methods of delivering aid in the possible absence of the cross-border option.”

“Nearly six out of ten Syrians struggle to put food on the table. (…) The Security Council must prioritize the lives of vulnerable Syrians over politics and take decisive action to ensure support for these resolutions.” beyond January 2023″, has settled.

Some 4.4 million people live in northwestern Syria, according to UN figures, which estimates that more than half are internally displaced people who have lived in camps for years. Of the total, some 4.1 million need humanitarian aid.