Violence halts rare delivery of food and medicine to eastern Ghouta

BEIRUT — The first aid delivery in weeks to reach the besieged eastern suburbs of Damascus was cut short after Syrian government forces began shelling the area while aid workers were still inside, a local council said Tuesday, amid a renewed escalation in the government’s deadly aerial and ground campaign.

Aid trucks had to leave before they could finish unloading supplies on Monday, as the eastern Ghouta suburbs suffered their worst day of violence since the UN Security Council demanded a 30-day ceasefire for Syria.

The Syrian American Medical Society charity, which supports hospitals in eastern Ghouta, said 79 people were killed in shelling and airstrikes, as the government, supported by Russia’s military, pushed its assault on the rebel-held suburbs, where the UN estimates close to 400,000 people are trapped under unmanageable levels of violence.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said 80 civilians were killed on Monday.

The Security Council resolution, which passed unanimously on Feb. 25, has gone unheeded. Monday’s aid shipment was the first to enter eastern Ghouta amid weeks of a crippling siege and a government assault that has killed close to 800 civilians since Feb. 18. Aid agencies, however, said Syrian authorities removed basic health supplies, including trauma, surgical kits and insulin, from the convoys before they set off.

The UN said airstrikes and shelling in eastern Ghouta and the shelling of Damascus continued for hours while the convoy was unloading supplies.

“After nearly nine hours inside, the decision was made to leave for security reasons and to avoid jeopardizing the safety of humanitarian teams on the ground,” said Jens Laerke, deputy spokesperson for the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. As a result, 14 of the 46 trucks in the convoy were not able to fully off-load critical humanitarian supplies. Of the 14, four were partially off-loaded, he said.

Laerke said the team found a desperate situation for people who have endured months without access to humanitarian aid. “Food for civilians was in short supply or prohibitively expensive and high rates of acute malnutrition were observed,” he said.

The violence called into question future aid deliveries. Another aid convoy is scheduled to enter eastern Ghouta on Thursday, but Laerke said security measures must be guaranteed for this to happen.

The International Committee for the Red Cross also confirmed that its joint convoy with the United Nations had to leave before off-loading all its supplies on account of the deteriorating security situation Monday.

Ingy Sedky, the ICRC spokesperson in Syria, said most of the aid from a 46-truck convoy was delivered to the town of Douma in eastern Ghouta but the mission was cut short before the rest of the supplies could be unloaded.

The convoy that reached Douma on Monday carried only a fraction of the relief needed for the estimated 400,000 people trapped under the government’s siege. The UN’s humanitarian office said the convoy carried food for 27,500 people. But it said the Syrian government off-loaded 70 per cent of the health supplies before allowing the convoy to enter eastern Ghouta.

The government routinely removes life-saving medical supplies from aid convoys. UN officials have complained for years about such actions by the Syrian government.