The major route allowing access for humanitarian aid to the populations of northwestern Syria is once again opening up. Damascus “has taken the sovereign decision to allow the United Nations and its specialized agencies to use the Bab Al-Hawa crossing point to deliver humanitarian aid to civilians in need in northwestern Syria, in the midst of cooperation and coordination with the Syrian government for a period of six months from July 13,” Syrian Ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Bassam Sabbagh, told reporters Thursday, July 13.

The latter sent a letter to this effect to the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, and to the Security Council. “We have just received the letter and we are studying it,” Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for Antonio Guterres, told Agence France-Presse.

A mechanism created in 2014 allowed the UN to deliver humanitarian aid to populations in rebel areas of northwestern Syria, without authorization from the Syrian government, which regularly denounced a violation of its sovereignty. Initially, it provided for four crossing points, but after years of pressure in particular from Moscow, an ally of the Syrian regime, only the Bab Al-Hawa post, between Turkey and Syria, had remained operational and its authorization had been withdrawn. reduced to six months renewable. But the mechanism expired on Monday, after the Council failed to extend it, causing the border crossing to be closed to UN trucks.

“The priority is that aid can once again get through, quickly, to the people who need it – and then secure its future,” British Ambassador Barbara Woodward, who chairs the Council, said in a statement. safety in July.

“But without UN oversight, control of this lifeline is handed over to the man responsible for the suffering of the Syrian people,” she lamented, noting that the oversight provided for in the rejected UN resolution Tuesday ensured that aid was not “diverted”.

An “obstruction”, according to Damascus

Due to the even greater needs since the February earthquakes, the UN, humanitarians and a majority of Council members insisted on an extension of at least one year to allow better aid planning. Faced with opposition from Russia, which was only asking for six months, a nine-month compromise was put to the Council’s vote on Tuesday. Compromise which Russia vetoed, preventing its adoption despite a large majority in favor of the proposal.

The Council also largely rejected a competing Russian text that provided for a six-month extension, but also challenged Western sanctions imposed on Syria. The Syrian ambassador on Thursday called the rejection of the Russian resolution an “obstruction”, announcing that his government had decided to open Bab Al-Hawa “in light of the intransigence of some member states of the Security Council and their persistence in refusing to introduce real improvements” to the cross-border aid mechanism.

“The Syrian government once again stresses that the United Nations and its representatives and personnel should not communicate with terrorist organizations and groups in northwestern Syria,” he insisted, repeating a regular argument from Damascus to oppose the UN mechanism.

Four million people in need

According to the UN, four million people in northwestern Syria, mostly women and children, need humanitarian assistance to survive after years of conflict, economic shocks, epidemics and growing poverty aggravated by devastating earthquakes. The mechanism, which expired on Monday, was helping 2.7 million people each month.

Despite this expiration, two other crossing points are still operational, authorized directly by President Bashar al-Assad after the February earthquakes. But the Bab Al-Hawa border post sees 85% of UN humanitarian aid transit to rebel areas.

Asked about the future of the two crossing points of Bab Al-Salam and Bab Al-Raee whose authorization expires on August 13, the Syrian ambassador estimated that there was still “time” to assess the situation and take a decision.