Syria

More than 600 family members of ISIL fighters have been repatriated from Syria to Kazakhstan over the last three years, as part of an initiative to rehabilitate women and children from the country. One formerly radicalized wife who married a member of the terrorist group, has been speaking to UN News about her regrets, and her hopes for a better future.

The UN and its partners need to reach more Syrians with immediate life-saving aid, the UN relief chief warned the Security Council on Thursday, calling for expanded access and more funds to sustain humanitarian operations, as the country struggles with an uptick in violence, deepening economic crisis, and a winter storm that has left a ‘trail of destruction’ in its wake. 

Four days after ISIL terrorists launched apparently coordinated attacks on a large prison in northeast Syria in a bid to free fighters detained there, the UN Human Rights Office, OHCHR, described the still unfolding situation on Tuesday as “deeply troubling”.

“Every day is a new adventure”, as part of the UN Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) in Syria, according to a young staff member who helps aid workers check in, board and fly safely between the capital, Damascus, and her home city in the north, Qamishli. 

World Food Programme (WFP) Executive Director David Beasley concluded a three-day visit to Syria on Friday, warning that more people there are in the grips of hunger than at any time during their country’s decade-long conflict.

The process of drafting a new constitution for Syria has been “a big disappointment” UN Special Envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen concluded on Friday. Following the end of discussions in Geneva, a consensus on how to move forward was not achieved, he added.

Four children – three boys and a girl - were killed on Monday morning while travelling to school in northwest Syria, along with a teacher, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Wednesday.

Following a decade of appalling suffering and losses in Syria, and amid a current period of relative calm, now is the time to push for a political process to end the fighting, UN Special Envoy Geir Pedersen told the Security Council on Tuesday.

In his speech to the high-level debate at the UN General Assembly on Monday, Fayssal Mekdad, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Expatriates of Syria, reaffirmed his country’s commitment to combat terrorism and aim to ‘restore security and stability’.

A decade of war in Syria has left more 350,200 people dead, High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet told the Human Rights Council on Friday, noting that this total was an “under-count of the actual number of killings”.