US urges 'unhindered' cross-border aid access to Syria

By Beyza Binnur Donmez

ANKARA (AA) - US State Secretary Antony Blinken on Monday called for an "unhindered" cross-border access to get humanitarian aid into Syria, saying it's "more important than ever".

Chairing a meeting of the UN Security Council (UNSC), Blinked said that it is "clear" that the needs of Syrians are not going to be met by the Bashar al-Assad regime.

"We must ensure Syrians get the aid they need," he said, adding: "The most efficient method is through border crossings [...] There is no good reason [that] crossings remain closed today."

The US secretary demanded reauthorization of both closed borders al-Yaroubiya and Bab al-Salam while keeping Bab al-Hawa, the only UN-authorized humanitarian border crossing in Syria, open.

Turning to the last weeks' regime attack on the al-Atareb hospital, which killed six patients and injured five staffers, Blinken said: "The coordinates had been shared with the UN, meaning the regime knew exactly where it was."

An additional Russian airstrike on the al-Bab border crossing with Turkey killed one civilian and injured two others.

- No single UN aid truck crossed Syria

UN's humanitarian aid chief Mark Lowcock told the UNSC that the organization delivers 1,000 trucks of cross-border aid to northwestern Syria every month and added: "We have yet to see even a single truck, just once, cross line."

Lowcock said that the reason of malnutrition in northwestern Syria is that the aid effort is not "big enough," while more than 75% of the civilians rely on UN aid.

He also said the hospital attack was "obviously deliberate".

For her part, UNICEF's Executive Director Henrietta Fore underlined that across Syria, "nearly 90% of children require humanitarian assistance".

"3.2 million inside Syria and neighboring countries are out-of-school," Fore said. "In the northeast, more than 37,000 children are languishing in the al-Hol and al-Roj camps. Over 800 children are in detention centers and prisons."

She urged the council to "renew the resolution on cross-border assistance" and "spare no effort to reach an agreement on accessing children through cross-line operations to reach Idlib Governorate and other parts of the northwest."

Syria has been mired in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests.

Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed since and more than 10 million displaced, according to UN figures.