Top rights investigators appointed by the Human Rights Council on Monday delivered a highly critical assessment of the role of the Syrian Government and the international community including the UN, in getting help to communities in the northwest, hit by last month’s deadly earthquake emergency.
Despite a reduction in largescale hostilities since a ceasefire in March, the UN Syrian Commission of Inquiry reported on Monday that armed actors continue to subject civilians to horrific and increasingly targeted abuse.
Hospitals, schools and homes have all been targeted during Syria’s brutal and long-running conflict, said UN-appointed investigators, who on Tuesday condemned likely fresh war crimes committed by all parties.
Humanitarian assistance needs to be scaled up significantly to more than a million people displaced by fighting in northwest Syria, a senior UN aid official said on Monday, amid reports that children are freezing to death on the Turkish border.
Nearly nine years of conflict in Syria have robbed boys and girls of their childhood and subjected them to “unabated violations of their rights”, including being killed, maimed, displaced, forced to fight or subjected to torture, rape and sexual slavery.
As the people of north-west Syria face intensifying violence, tens of thousands of women and children continue to be kept in “inhumane conditions” in a remote camp on the other side of the country, UN-appointed independent investigators said on Wednesday.
Senior United Nations officials in Syria warned on Tuesday of the dire humanitarian crisis in several parts of the country, calling on warring parties to immediately stop fighting so aid and basic services can reach those in need, and the sick and critically wounded can evacuate.