Restrictions on aid deliveries by the Bashar Assad regime are preventing medical supplies and personnel needed to prevent, contain and treat COVID-19 from reaching 2 million people in northeast Syria, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Tuesday.
“Two million people are stuck in northeast Syria without the tools to tackle outbreaks of Covid-19,” said Gerry Simpson, associate crisis and conflict director at HRW. “As the number of infections rise, global and regional leaders should urgently act to allow lifesaving medical supplies and staff to reach those in desperate need of support.”
The HRW in a statement urged the regime to reverse their longstanding restrictions on aid to northeast Syria and allow medical supplies and personnel into the region.
The first confirmed COVID-19-related death in northeast Syria was announced on April 17. The report, however, said that Syria’s limited testing capacity, especially in northeast Syria, means the real number may be much higher.
“Nine years of conflict have decimated Syria’s infrastructure and social services, including for health care, resulting in massive humanitarian needs and leaving the population, including about 6 million internally displaced people, vulnerable to a Covid-19 outbreak,” the statement said.
Far from aiding the people of its country, the Assad regime has been rather set on destroying available infrastructure and attacking civilians. According to the U.N., about 50% of medical infrastructure in Syria is out of service, making the fight against the coronavirus a hard task.
Until January, the U.N. Security Council allowed U.N. agencies to transport aid through a border crossing, from Rabia, in Iraq, to al-Yarubiyah, in northeast Syria. It was mainly used by the World Health Organization (WHO) to supply the region with medical aid.
Al-Yarubiyah is one of four border crossings the U.N. Security Council authorized in a 2014 resolution, which has allowed the U.N. and other aid agencies to deliver supplies to Syria’s northeast through Iraq, to its northwest through Turkey and to its south through Jordan, the statement elaborated.
Accordingly, the Security Council adopted this approach to address the Syrian regime’s persistent refusal to give the U.N. and other aid agencies explicit permission to supply areas not under regime control with aid.
Yet, due to Russia’s threat to veto the mandate, on Jan. 10, the Security Council officially removed al-Yarubiyah and Ramtha, a crossing point on the Jordan-Syria border, from the list of authorized border crossings, halting all U.N. cross-border aid into northeastern and southern Syria.
“Under international law, Syria has an obligation to realize the entire population’s right to health. Although limited resources and capacity may mean that these rights can only be fully realized over time, the authorities are still obliged not to discriminate between different parts of the population, and they must justify any aid delivery limitations,” the HRW said, adding that under international humanitarian law, consent to allow relief operations cannot be withheld on arbitrary grounds.
Yearslong sieges have caused the deterioration of the physical health of many Syrians, who have suffered from malnutrition and widespread poverty. Another risk is that people often live in overcrowded places and camps, ideal for the spread of the virus. The camps are generally in poor conditions with a lack of access to water, hygiene, medical aid and food.
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