Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hopes that the United Nations' cross-border humanitarian aid mechanism that allows relief organizations to move supplies from Turkey to Syria is extended this coming July, Michiel Hofman, the MSF's director of operations, told Sputnik in an interview
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd March, 2021) Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hopes that the United Nations' cross-border humanitarian aid mechanism that allows relief organizations to move supplies from Turkey to Syria is extended this coming July, Michiel Hofman, the MSF's director of operations, told Sputnik in an interview.
The United Nations Security Council back in 2014 established the cross-border aid mechanism, which allowed the UN and its humanitarian partners to bring aid into Syria through four border points: two on the border with Turkey, and one each on the borders of Iraq and Jordan.
In January 2020, the number of accessible border points was reduced to two: the Bab al-Salam and Bab al-Hawa crossings from Turkey, and six months later, the UNSC extended the mandate for aid deliveries through the Bab al-Hawa crossing for 12 months.
Russia abstained from the July vote, along with China and the Dominican Republic. Moscow has opposed the cross-border aid mechanism, noting that the current system no longer corresponds with the situation on the ground in Syria, following the significant gains made by Syrian government forces over the past 18 months.
The UN Security Council is set to review the cross-border aid mechanism this coming July, when the current mandate expires, and Hofman said that the MSF hopes the system for delivering aid into northern Syria is prolonged.
"It remains problematic in the northeast of Syria that the official cross-border authorization from the United Nations into those areas was not included in the last extension of the UN resolution, and also for the northwest, where this cross-border mandate given by the United Nations is still valid, but is up for review again in July. As long as humanitarian assistance is necessary, we would certainly hope that this access for medical and other humanitarian groups, as well as staff, can be assured and maintained," Hofman stated.
The MSF's director of operations said that ensuring the swift delivery of supplies was crucial as Syria is still in the midst of a humanitarian crisis.
"We still have a massive displaced population and a general population that has lost access to health care and other essential services because of 10 years of devastation and violence and destruction; so the main message is that the humanitarian crisis is not over," Hofman remarked.
In a press release published on July 11, following the UNSC's extension of the cross-border aid mechanism, the Russian Foreign Ministry said that Moscow is committed to ensuring that humanitarian deliveries to Syria take place in accordance with humanitarian law, a call that has been echoed by Damascus.
According to a resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1991, humanitarian assistance "should be provided with the consent of the affected country" in order to maintain the "sovereignty, territorial integrity and national unity" of the nation in question.
