An MSF aid convoy has reached the earthquake zone in northwestern Syria via the border with Turkey. In the rebel-controlled area, aid after the earthquakes of February 6 is difficult to get started.
The MSF aid convoy consists of fourteen trucks. The aid organization can now distribute nearly 1,300 tents and 1,300 ‘winter kits’ to families in refugee camps. There is an urgent need for this, because the living conditions are very bad due to the war and winter.
The number of people in those camps has increased sharply since the earthquakes as thousands of homes have been destroyed. According to the United Nations, some 1.8 million displaced persons are currently living in these reception centres.
Earlier this week, a UN convoy with at least 178 trucks with aid supplies also reached northwestern Syria. Before the earthquake, trucks from Turkey crossed the Syrian border every day to deliver humanitarian aid to people in the area. With the earthquakes, that aid temporarily came to a complete halt.
Aid in Syria is struggling to get going after disaster
Although the governments of Turkey and Syria are cooperating well with the relief efforts after the earthquakes, the rebels in the northwest of the country are not. That said David Beasley, director of the UN World Food Program (WFP), during his visit to the international security conference in Munich on Saturday.
Northwestern Syria is controlled by rebels opposed to President Bashar Al Assad. “Those local authorities don’t give us enough access,” says Beasley, who calls the area the “bottleneck” of the relief effort. “That needs to change immediately.”
Among other things, he wants more border crossings to be opened with Turkey. The border crossing at Bab al-Hawa is now the only one through which convoys from Turkey can enter northwestern Syria.
