Cranes ready to drop aid into Syrian camps need Jordan OK

AMMAN, Jordan — United Nations aid agencies have procured cranes to hoist large amounts of food and other supplies over an earthen barrier to tens of thousands of Syrians stranded on the border with Jordan but are still waiting for Jordan’s promised go-ahead, an official said Monday.

The cranes are to drop a one-off shipment of 30 days’ worth of food in two large encampments along a remote desert stretch on the border — an area known as the berm because of two parallel earthen mounds that roughly mark the frontier.

Jordan agreed to the shipment in mid-July but has failed to give the final go-ahead for the operation, said a senior aid official who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to brief reporters.

She said the logistics for the shipment are in place, including the procurement of cranes that are to hoist the heavy packages from Jordanian soil over the berm.

A Jordanian government official reiterated that the one-time shipment was approved. “The logistics will be left to Jordanian agencies on the field,” said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with briefing regulations. He did not elaborate.

Jordan sealed the berm area more than a month ago, after a cross-border attack by Islamic State extremists killed seven Jordanian troops. The closing halted what until then had been regular aid deliveries from Jordan’s territory to more than 60,000 Syrians stranded on the other side of the berm.

Jordan says its security concerns trump other considerations, including humanitarian aid. Since the border closing, only sporadic water deliveries have reached the area.