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In Syria, needs are immense and some aid agencies are calling for more funds, despite generous donors such as the UK pledging many millions.
But there’s a serious concern that much aid is simply not reaching a huge number of Syrians, especially those in opposition-controlled areas.
“Much more needs to be done to ensure people inside Syria can access aid and healthcare,” says Leigh Daynes, Executive Director of Doctors of the World UK. “Our volunteer medics in Lebanon and Jordan are doing the best they can to help those who’ve fled Syria but they’re powerless to help many who desperately need them inside the country."
The United Nations recently released its revised Syria Humanitarian response Plan (SHARP) that aims to address the large-scale crisis in Syria. But the plan has been severely compromised as the Syrian government will not allow humanitarian organizations to deliver aid to opposition-held areas through neighbouring countries.
“Yet again, politics trumps meeting urgent need,” says Leigh Daynes. “We cannot be complicit in this conspiracy that robs innocent girls, boys, women and men of help and protection. The world has stood by in silence too many times before.”
A massive challenge for the international humanitarian community is this growing tension between the need to follow international law and the practical realities of helping vulnerable populations in extreme circumstances. International humanitarian law does not grant humanitarian agencies the legal right to enter a sovereign territory without the consent of the state.
And while Syria has permitted aid to be taken to opposition-held areas from Damascus, it continues to refuse permission for any cross-border assistance. In February and March this year almost 300,000 Syrians were effectively cut off from aid as the government shut down all cross-line operations by the Syrian Arab Red Crescent.
“The UN Security Council needs to consider alternative forms of aid delivery including cross-border operations.” Valerie Amos, under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, wrote back in April. “Too many lives are being lost.”
A May 8 UN General Assembly resolution called on the Syrian government to authorize aid operations from neighbouring countries, demanding that the Syrian government “facilitate the access of humanitarian organizations to all people in need through the most effective routes, including by providing authorization for cross-border humanitarian operations as an urgent priority.”
This need is compounded as much of the aid coming from Damascus is simply not getting through due to bureaucratic hurdles and security concerns.
“You cannot negotiate the 54 checkpoints between Damascus and Aleppo everyday with the quantity of aid that Aleppo needs,” John Ging, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) Operations Director, said back in April. “But you can drive it in one hour from Turkey efficiently and effectively.”
He went on to say: “There is no logical reason why you can cross a conflict line but not a border. But there is a consequence: people are dying.”
These consequences are seen by Doctors of the World teams every day. We have workers on the ground in Syria and in many locations in the bordering countries who, as well as providing essential medical care, also bear witness to what they see. And along with the lives lost from lack of access to aid and healthcare, we’re regularly seeing medical workers being targeted by both sides.
Leila, 21, is a volunteer rescuer from Aleppo who has witnessed attacks against healthcare facilities and medical personnel.
“I was working in the Dar al Shifa hospital which was bombed,” she reported to Doctors of the World. “The government’s forces were using ambulances to attack field hospitals. Three nurses were arrested because they were carrying first aid kits; their partly burned bodies were returned to their families seven days later.”
This week a Syrian Red Crescent worker was killed while on duty in a clearly marked ambulance and only last month a British doctor was killed in Syria after a makeshift hospital he was working in was shelled. Doctors of the world has called upon those fighting to respect the rules of international law and stop targeting civilians and health workers.
“It is our responsibility to remind the government forces just as much as the armed groups in Syria that not everything is permitted,” says Dr. Thierry Brigaud, President of Médecins du Monde France. “No, you cannot bomb hospitals and neighbourhoods with impunity. You cannot finish off the wounded or execute the doctors and staff that seek to help them.”
Under international law, humanitarian and medical workers must be granted freedom of movement by all parties to the conflict, and be protected from attack, intimidation or detention. And above all else, they must be allowed rapid and unimpeded access to civilians who are in need.
