Russia Sending Sappers to Palmyra
Russia has reported sending sappers to Palmyra to help clear landmines after successfully driving out ISIS fighters, the Associated Press reports.
The combat engineers were airlifted to Syria and are equipped with state-of-the art robotic devices and strategic equipment to disable landmines in the ancient city of Palmyra, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said on Wednesday.
The team, which included sniffer dogs, was transported on a military plane from an air base outside Moscow.
The news came following President Vladimir Putin’s announcement of a partial military withdrawal from Syria two weeks ago.
Syria’s state-run news agency reported President Bashar al-Assad’s readiness to invest all efforts into rebuilding Palmyra, and expressed his gratitude for Ban Ki-moon’s encouraging statements regarding the recapture of the ancient archaeological site from ISIS.
U.N. Urges States to Take Half Million Syrian Refugees
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged countries on Wednesday to resettle nearly half a million Syrian refugees in the next three years, Reuters reports.
Only the U.S., Italy and Sweden have pledged to take part in the United Nations refugee agency’s plan.
Since 2013, countries have pledged 179,000 places, according to the agency’s figures, with the number of pledges increasing to 185,000, creating only 6,000 additional places.
Aid groups such as Oxfam and the Norwegian Refugee Council expressed disappointment in the governments’ “shocking lack of political and moral leadership. Almost all states attending have failed to show the level of generosity required,” reads a joint statement.
The E.U. proposed to allocate 54,000 places for Syrian refugees in Turkey, while Ban Ki-moon urged countries to find new legal ways to admit refugees, such as humanitarian admission and family reunions, in addition to labor and study opportunities.
“These are people with death at their back and a wall in their face,” U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein said.
Only 30 Percent of Aid Reaches Syria’s Besieged Areas
U.N. humanitarian chief Stephen O’Brien told the Security Council on Wednesday that only 30 percent of Syrians living in besieged areas and less than 10 percent in hard-to-reach areas have received aid this year, the Associated Press reports.
O’Brien said that despite the U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire and the ongoing peace talks in Geneva, many of the 4.6 million Syrians in need in these areas can’t be reached because of security and combat obstructions.
He stressed that the U.N. and its partners are still “a long way from the sustained, unconditional and unimpeded access” required under international law and U.N. resolutions.
The chief added that since the beginning of 2016, aid convoys have been able to reach 150,000 people in 11 of the 18 besieged areas in the country. However, aid for major besieged areas of Duma, East Harasta and Daraya hasn’t been approved yet.
“The situation is dreadful in these areas, particularly in Daraya, where we continue to receive reports of severe shortages of food, clean water, medicines, electricity and basic commodities, with the food security and nutrition status thought to be disastrous, with even reports of people forced to eat grass,” O’Brien said.
He strongly criticized the Syrian government for seizing aid and medical supplies from convoys, saying over 80,000 medical items have been removed.
Recommended Reads
- The Atlantic: The End of the Beginning in Syria
- Foreign Affairs: The U.N.’s Role in the Sieges in Syria
- Syria Direct: Syrian pound meets ‘a bout of extreme weakness’ after Moscow announces withdrawal
- WIRED: It’d Be Great to Kick ISIS Offline—If It Were Possible
- Voice of America: IS ‘Cyrillic Jihadists’ Create Their Own Community in Syria
- The Washington Post: Special forces for Syria, Americans leaving Turkey, and more U.S. military for Europe
- The Washington Post: Witness the stunning devastation inside Aleppo’s destroyed souks
- The New York Times: With Jihadis at the Door, Syrians Rush to Rescue History
Top image: A boy stands by the hanging laundry in the makeshift refugee camp at the northern Greek border point of Idomeni, Greece, Thursday, March 31, 2016. More than 50,000 migrants remain stranded in Greece following border restrictions and closures by Austria and Balkan nations. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic)