Over half a million Syrians living under siege by regime forces received the holy month of Ramadan amid severe misery and hunger.
Regime forces and the Hezbollah militia besiege the towns of Madaya, Jiroud, Rahibah, Almoadamiyah, Daraya, Zabadani, eastern Ghouta, Alyarmouk refugee camp, Kanaker and Ahajar Alaswad in the Damascus suburbs as well as Talbeesah, Alrastan, Alhoula and Alwaer in Homs province. The ISIS group, meanwhile, besiege central Deir Ezzor.
Nearly 625,000 people live under siege by regime forces and ISIS, and they are distributed as follows: 50,000 in Madaya northeast of Damascus, 325,000 in eastern Ghouta, 40,000 in Almoadamiya and Daraya west of Damascus, 60,000 in the Yarmouk refugee camp and Alhajar Alaswad, 15,000 in Alwaer district near Homs, and 120,000 in Deir Ezzor.
Jan Egeland, a senior adviser to the UN Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura on May 26 said that they had thus far reached only 160,000 people out of more than one million people in urgent need.
Egeland described the humanitarian situation in Daraya, Almoadamiyah and Douma as extremely dire, warning that children affected by hunger in Almoadamiyah would die if they didn’t get access to humanitarian aid.
Spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General Stéphane Dujarric on June 2 said that an aid convoy entered Daraya for the first time since 2012, adding that regime forces removed medicines, food for children, and vaccines.
On May 12, an aid convoy heading to Daraya was refused entry by regime forces.
UN envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura on May 19 said that the UN will consider launching airdrops of relief aid to the besieged areas as a last resort if no progress was made regarding the delivery of humanitarian aid to those in need.
Assistant of the UN special envoy to Syria Ramzi Izz al-Din on Thursday said that they were waiting the Assad regime’s approval to launch relief airdrops to the areas to which no aid was introduced by land routes. (Source: Anadolu)
