Talk of closing last Syrian aid lifeline ‘a moral abomination,’ UN commission says

In this file photo, Syrian refugees make their way through a border crossing to Turkey. (AFP file)
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Updated 27 May 2022
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Talk of closing last Syrian aid lifeline ‘a moral abomination,’ UN commission says

  • Cross-border agreement set to expire on July 10, with Security Council members already sparring over whether it should be extended
  • Number of Syrians facing hunger has almost doubled since 2019, as Ukraine war pushes up prices, and hits wheat and fuel supplies

NEW YORK: With the current UN Security Council’s exceptional authorization for humanitarian aid delivery through the last remaining border crossing into northwest Syria set to expire on July 10, the UN Syria Commission of Inquiry warned that it would be a “failure of the highest order” if the council failed to extend the life-saving operation.

“As the country faces its worst economic and humanitarian crisis since the start of the conflict, the international community must safeguard existing, life-saving cross-border assistance and increase their funding pledges to support this aid,” said a commission statement, which also expressed alarm at what it called a “trajectory of consistent narrowing of the cross-border humanitarian aid delivery.”

When deliveries of international aid to Syria began in 2014, the Security Council approved four border crossings. In January 2020, permanent member Russia used its power of veto to force the closure of all but one, Bab-al-Hawa.

Moscow argues that international aid operations violate Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Security Council discussions about the issue often prove difficult, with Russia and China consistently insisting that all humanitarian aid deliveries require the consent of the Syrian authorities.

Opposing views among council members last week on the need to extend the cross-border mechanism have sparked concern among humanitarian agencies, as the crossing so far has guaranteed access to desperately needed aid for millions of Syrians since 2014.

“It is a moral abomination that a Security Council resolution was in itself deemed necessary to facilitate cross-border aid in the face of consistent violations — by the government of Syria and other parties — of their obligations under international law to allow and facilitate humanitarian relief for civilians in need,” Paulo Pinheiro, chair of the UN Syria Commission, said.

The July 10 renewal vote comes as humanitarian needs throughout Syria are at their highest since the start of the war 11 years ago.

The UN estimates that 14.6 million Syrians are now in need of aid. Across the war-ravaged country, 12 million people face acute food insecurity, a staggering 51 percent increase since 2019, amid a conflict in Ukraine that has sent food prices skyrocketing and threatened supplies of wheat and other commodities.
 
In opposition-held northwest Syria, conditions are deteriorating due to continuing hostilities and a deepening economic crisis. About 4.1 million people there, mostly women and children, depend on aid to meet their basic needs.

Cross-border operations authorized by the Security Council allow aid to reach around 2.4 million people every month.

The commission said in its latest report that this lifeline is vital to the population in northwest Syria, adding that while some aid is delivered cross-line from within Syria, these deliveries contain much smaller, insufficient quantities and are exposed to attacks along a dangerous delivery route that crosses active front lines.

During its 11 years of investigating the conflict, the commission has documented that both the government and armed groups have repeatedly used humanitarian aid as a political bargaining chip, often deliberately withholding it for specific populations, particularly those under siege.

The commission also maintains that across all territories of Syria, staff members of humanitarian organizations constantly run the risk of being harassed, arbitrarily arrested and detained.

Commissioner Hanny Megally said: “Parties to the conflict have consistently failed in their obligation to allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief for civilians in need across Syria. It is unconscionable that the discussion seems to focus on whether to close the one remaining authorized border crossing for aid, rather than how to expand access to life-saving aid across the country and through every appropriate route.”

Earlier this month, humanitarian aid organizations sounded the alarm at an EU-hosted Brussels VI Conference on Syria.

“The funds for humanitarian assistance are simply not sufficient to address the needs and protect the Syrians right now,” Pinheiro said.

“The international community cannot now abandon the Syrian people. They have endured 11 years of devastating conflict that has inflicted unspeakable suffering. They have never been more impoverished and in need of our help.”


Four killed in Syria in attack on Aleppo university dorms, state news agency says

Updated 41 min 37 sec ago
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Four killed in Syria in attack on Aleppo university dorms, state news agency says

  • Islamist militants launched an incursion on Wednesday into a dozen towns and villages in the northwestern province of Aleppo
  • The attack was the biggest since March 2020 when Russia agreed to a ceasefire to end years of fighting

DUBAI: Four civilians including two students were killed on Friday in the Syrian city of Aleppo in insurgent shelling of university student dormitories, the state news agency SANA reported.

More than 240 people, mostly combatants, were killed as intense fighting approached Syria’s northern Aleppo city after militants launched a major offensive on government-held areas this week, a monitor said Friday.

Rebels led by the Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham launched an incursion on Wednesday into a dozen towns and villages in the northwestern province of Aleppo, which is controlled by Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government forces.

“The combatants’ death toll in the ongoing... operation in the Idlib and Aleppo countrysides has risen to 218,” since Wednesday, said the British-based monitor with a network of sources inside Syria.

In addition to the fighters, it said 24 civilians were killed.

Syrian ally Russia launched air strikes that killed 19 civilians on Thursday, while another civilian had been killed in Syrian army shelling a day earlier, said the Observatory which on Thursday had reported an overall toll of about 200 dead, including the civilians.

The attack was the biggest since March 2020 when Russia, which backs Assad, and Turkiye, which supports the rebels, agreed to a ceasefire to end years of fighting that had uprooted millions of Syrians opposed to Assad’s rule.


Israeli military says Lebanese prohibited from moving south to several villages

Updated 29 November 2024
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Israeli military says Lebanese prohibited from moving south to several villages

  • Israel opened fire on Thursday toward what it called ‘suspects’ with vehicles arriving at several areas in the southern zone

DUBAI: Lebanese residents are prohibited from moving south to a line of villages and their surroundings until further notice, Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on X on Friday.
Israel said it opened fire on Thursday toward what it called “suspects” with vehicles arriving at several areas in the southern zone, saying it was a breach of the truce with Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah, which came into effect on Wednesday.
Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah in turn accused Israel of violating the deal.
“The Israeli enemy is attacking those returning to the border villages,” Fadlallah told reporters, adding “there are violations today by Israel, even in this form.”
The Israeli military also said on Thursday the air force struck a facility used by Hezbollah to store mid-range rockets in southern Lebanon, the first such attack since the ceasefire took effect on Wednesday morning.
In his recent post, Adraee called on Lebanese residents to not return to more than 60 southern villages, saying anyone who moves south of the specified line “puts themselves in danger.”
The Lebanese army earlier accused Israel of violating the ceasefire several times on Wednesday and Thursday.
The exchange of accusations highlighted the fragility of the ceasefire, which was brokered by the United States and France to end the conflict, fought in parallel with the Gaza war. The truce lasts for 60 days in the hope of reaching a permanent cessation of hostilities.


Iraq tries to stem influx of illegal foreign workers from Pakistan, other nations

Updated 29 November 2024
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Iraq tries to stem influx of illegal foreign workers from Pakistan, other nations

  • The Iraqi labor ministry says the influx is mainly from Pakistan, Syria and Bangladesh, also citing 40,000 registered immigrant workers
  • Authorities are trying to regulate the number of foreign workers as Iraq seeks to diversify from the currently dominant hydrocarbons sector

KARBALA: Rami, a Syrian worker in Iraq, spends his 16-hour shifts at a restaurant fearing arrest as authorities crack down on undocumented migrants in the country better known for its own exodus.
He is one of hundreds of thousands of foreigners working without permits in Iraq, which after emerging from decades of conflict has become an unexpected destination for many seeking opportunities.
“I’ve been able to avoid the security forces and checkpoints,” said the 27-year-old, who has lived in Iraq for seven years and asked that AFP use a pseudonym to protect his identity.
Between 10 in the morning and 2:00 am the next day, he toils at a shawarma shop in the holy city of Karbala, where millions of Shiite pilgrims congregate every year.
“My greatest fear is to be expelled back to Syria where I’d have to do military service,” he said.
The labor ministry says the influx is mainly from Syria, Pakistan and Bangladesh, also citing 40,000 registered immigrant workers.
Now the authorities are trying to regulate the number of foreign workers, as the country seeks to diversify from the currently dominant hydrocarbons sector.
Many like Rami work in the service industry in Iraq.
One Baghdad restaurant owner admitted to AFP that he has to play cat and mouse with the authorities during inspections, asking some employees to make themselves scarce.
Not all those who work for him are registered, he said, because of the costly fees involved.
Some of the undocumented workers in Iraq first came as pilgrims. In July, Labour Minister Ahmed Assadi said his services were investigating information that “50,000 Pakistani visitors” stayed on “to work illegally.”
Despite threats of expulsion because of the scale of issue, the authorities at the end of November launched a scheme for “Syrian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers” to regularise their employment by applying online before December 25.
The ministry says it will take legal action against anyone who brings in or employs undocumented foreign workers.
Rami has decided to play safe, even though “I really want” to acquire legal employment status.
“But I’m afraid,” he said. “I’m waiting to see what my friends do, and then I’ll do the same.”
Current Iraqi law caps the number of foreign workers a company can employ at 50 percent, but the authorities now want to lower this to 30 percent.
“Today we allow in only qualified workers for jobs requiring skills” that are not currently available, labor ministry spokesman Nijm Al-Aqabi told AFP.
It’s a sensitive issue — for the past two decades, even the powerful oil sector has been dominated by a foreign workforce. But now the authorities are seeking to favor Iraqis.
“There are large companies contracted to the government” which have been asked to limit “foreign worker numbers to 30 percent,” said Aqabi.
“This is in the interests of the domestic labor market,” he said, as 1.6 million Iraqis are unemployed.
He recognized that each household has the right to employ a foreign domestic worker, claiming this was work Iraqis did not want to do.
One agency launched in 2021 that brings in domestic workers from Niger, Ghana and Ethiopia confirms the high demand.
“Before we used to bring in 40 women, but now it’s around 100” a year, said an employee at the agency, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity.
It was a trend picked up from rich countries in the Gulf, the employee said.
“The situation in Iraq is getting better, and with salaries now higher, Iraqi home owners are looking for comfort.”
A domestic worker earns about $230 a month, but the authorities have quintupled the registration fee, with a work permit now costing more than $800.
In the summer, Human Rights Watch denounced what it called a campaign of arbitrary arrests and expulsions targeting Syrians, even those with the necessary paperwork.
HRW said that both homes and work places had been targeted by raids.
Ahmed — another pseudonym — is a 31-year-old Syrian who has been undocumented in Iraq for the past year and a half.
He began as a cook in Baghdad and later moved to Karbala.
“Life is hard here — we don’t have any rights,” he told AFP. “We come in illegally, and the security forces are after us.”
His wife did not accompany him. She stayed in Syria.
“I’d go back if I could,” said Ahmed. “But life there is very difficult. There’s no work.”


Gaza journalists win video award for ‘powerful’ war coverage

Updated 29 November 2024
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Gaza journalists win video award for ‘powerful’ war coverage

  • Belal Alsabbagh and Youssef assouna were presented the “News” award for their work on the devastating conflict set off by last year’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel
  • The prize has been awarded since 1995 in memory of video journalist Rory Peck, who was killed in Moscow in 1993, to highlight the work of freelance video journalists

LONDON: Gaza video correspondents Belal Alsabbagh and Youssef Hassouna on Thursday won a Rory Peck award for their “powerful” coverage of the brutal war in the Palestinian territory for Agence France-Presse.
The prize has been awarded since 1995 in memory of video journalist Rory Peck, who was killed in Moscow in 1993, to highlight the work of freelance video journalists.
Alsabbagh, 33, and Hassouna, 47, were presented the “News” award for their work on the devastating conflict set off by last year’s October 7 attack on Israel.
“Belal and Youssef’s work is remarkable for its range of emotions, we understood the dreadful scale of destruction in their drone shots and in the relentless attack,” the jury said in a tribute.
“This is visual reporting of the highest order. It’s not just a checklist of breaking news events, but powerful storytelling with empathy, courage and talent,” it added.
Among the heart-wrenching images entered in the contest were sequences of a man desperately searching for a relative in the debris after a strike, a woman howling in grief over a body in a hospital and Gaza residents queuing for food.
Alsabbagh, who left Gaza in April with his wife and daughter, was in London for the ceremony. In September, he was also awarded a prestigious Bayeux-Calvados prize for war correspondents.

This October 12, 2024 photo shows videographer Belal AlSabbagh (2nd left) and four other Palestinian media practitioners during the award ceremony as part of the 2024 edition of the “Prix Bayeux Calvados-Normandie of the war correspondents” in Bayeux,  France. (AFP)

“Despite my overflowing joy tonight, I have a heavy heart because members of my family and friends are still in Gaza, facing hunger, fear and still facing bombs,” said Alsabbagh, who has worked for AFP since 2017.
Hassouna, who has contributed to AFP since 2014 and is still in Gaza, has had to move home 10 times since the start of the war.
He has been one of the key independent video journalists working for AFP during the conflict.
“Everybody at AFP is tremendously proud of Belal and the work of his colleagues in Gaza. This award is a deserved recompense for his excellent journalism under seemingly impossible conditions,” said AFP global news director Phil Chetwynd.
“This prize rewards the courage of Belal and Youssef whose images for AFP showed television stations around the world the reality of the conflict in Gaza and the consequences for its civilian population,” said Guillaume Meyer, deputy news director for video and audio.
“I am very happy that their commitment and the quality of their work in incredibly difficult conditions has been recognized,” Meyer added.
“The Rory Peck award gives a precious support to freelance journalists without whom we could not work in numerous countries,” he said.
This is the sixth time since 2014 that an AFP correspondent has won a Rory Peck prize.
Among this year’s three finalists was Luckenson Jean, a freelancer for AFP covering the crisis in Haiti, where armed gangs have run amok.


 


44,330 Gazans killed in more than 13 months of war

Updated 29 November 2024
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44,330 Gazans killed in more than 13 months of war

  • Medics said Israeli military strikes killed at least 17 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Thursday

GAZA CITY: The Health Ministry in Gaza said on Thursday that at least 44,330 people have been killed in more than 13 months of war between Israel and Palestinian militants.
The toll includes 48 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry, which said 104,933 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began when Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Medics said Israeli military strikes killed at least 17 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Thursday as forces stepped up bombardments on central areas and pushed tanks deeper in the north and south of the enclave.
Six people were killed in two separate airstrikes on a house and near the hospital of Kamal Adwan in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, while four others were killed when an Israeli strike hit a motorcycle in Khan Younis in the south.

In Nuseirat, one of the Gaza Strip’s eight historic refugee camps, Israeli planes carried out several airstrikes, destroying a multi-floor building and hitting roads outside mosques.
At least seven people were killed in some of those strikes, health officials said.
Medics said at least two people, a woman and a child, were killed in tank shelling that hit western areas of Nuseirat, while an air strike killed five others in a house nearby. In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, tanks pushed deeper into the northern-west area of the city, residents said.
Months of attempts to negotiate a ceasefire have yielded scant progress, and negotiations are now on hold.