S/PV.7701 Security Council

In accordance with rule 37 of the Council’s provisional rules of procedure, I invite the representative of the Syrian Arab Republic to participate in this meeting. In accordance with rule 39 of the Council’s provisional rules of procedure, I invite Mr. Stephen O’Brien, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, to participate in this meeting. On behalf of the Council, I welcome Mr. O’Brien, who is joining today’s meeting via video-teleconference from Geneva. The Security Council will now begin its consideration of the item on its agenda. I wish to draw the attention of Council members to document S/2016/460, which contains the report of the Secretary-General on the implementation of Security Council resolutions 2139 (2014), 2165 (2014), 2191 (2014) and 2258 (2015). I now give the floor to Mr. O’Brien. Mr. O’Brien: I returned yesterday from a town called Reyhanlı, in Turkey, just across the border from Syria. What I saw there was harrowing — orphaned Syrian girls and boys ranging from toddlers to young teens with no family left to look after them. I went to a hospital and met Syrians who had been injured after the internally displaced person (IDP) camp they had fled to in Syria to escape violence was itself recently bombed. I sat down at Dr. Mazin’s bedside as he struggled for life with appalling and severe brain, abdominal and facial wounds, after he was struck by an air strike on Al-Quds hospital in eastern Aleppo on 27 April, as he was bravely himself saving lives. A bare whisper was all he could muster: “Please, peace”. I met refugee families traumatized by the effects of five years of constant war who dream of nothing more than returning to Syria to live a normal life. I promised to carry their stories to the Security Council. I promised to highlight once more the tragic and ever-worsening situation in Syria. But truth be told, I have run out of words to fully explain how the actions of the parties to the conflict have led to the devastation of a country and its people. As the war continues, it is innocent civilians and children who continue to be subjected to even greater levels of suffering and misery than could ever have been imagined five years ago. I remain particularly concerned at the upsurge in violence across various parts of the country and its impact on civilians. Indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals, mosques and public markets, continue with impunity and total disregard for international humanitarian law. In early May, scores of civilians were killed and injured by strikes hitting two IDP settlements in Sarmada, Idlib. These were places where displaced people had sought sanctuary from the conflict. One of the strikes reportedly hit a school tent, resulting in the deaths of eight children. Just this week, several terrorist attacks claimed the lives of over 100 civilians in the coastal cities of Jableh and Tartous. Over 40 patients and accompanying family members were killed and 35 people injured when a suicide bomber walked into the Jableh hospital and detonated an explosives belt. An emergency doctor and two nurses died in that explosion, with another 11 health workers wounded. Similarly, Ziad Al-Buqaa hospital — Khan Al-Shih’s last operational hospital serving people in Khan Al-Shih, Zakia and surrounding areas  — was reportedly struck by barrel bombs on 17 May. This hospital provided medical services to 4,200 patients daily and served about 100,000. The continued use of siege and starvation as a weapon of war is reprehensible. We are continually monitoring the situation on the ground throughout Syria and, based on the latest information, we now estimate that some 592,700 people are currently living in besieged areas. This includes 452,700 people besieged by the Government of Syria in various locations in rural Damascus, as well as in the Al-Waer area of Homs city, an area that I visited myself just a few months ago, but which has been closed off since March. Elsewhere, 110,000 people are besieged by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Deir ez-Zor city, 20,000 people by non-State armed groups and the Al-Nusra Front in Foah and Kefraya in Idlib, and 10,000 besieged by the Government of Syria and non-State armed groups in Yarmouk, Damascus. These figures are shocking, as they underscore the sharply deteriorating situation for civilians, even while the cessation of hostilities is in place. According to the most recent report of the Secretary-General (S/2016/460), the number of people in besieged areas was 517,700, itself up from 486,7000, due to more accurate numbers of people emerging from Deir ez-Zor, Foah and Kefraya, and Yarmouk, as the facts on the ground have changed. But I must reinforce that these figures are really shocking. Today, 592,700 people are living in besieged areas because of the appalling deteriorating situation in Al-Waer on the other side of the very line I myself crossed last year, as reported to the Council in detail. The punishment of civilians through besiegement tactics must stop immediately. The primary responsibility lies with the party that maintains the siege and routinely and systematically denies people the basic necessities of life and freedom of movement. However, other parties that conduct military activities in or from populated areas, endangering their safety, also bear their share of responsibility for the immense suffering in besieged areas. And we cannot ignore the fact that many on all sides are profiting handsomely at the expense of innocent civilians from their ability to control the goods that enter through irregular and unofficial channels. The humanitarian and protection situation in many hard-to-reach areas also remains critical, including in some that are on the brink of besiegement. I remain extremely concerned about the conditions for the hundreds of thousands of civilians in northern rural Homs, specifically in the towns of Rastan, Talbiseh and Taldo, as well as in the adjacent area of Habarnafse in rural Hama. People in these areas have limited freedom of movement and diminished access to clean water, medical care and food. The recent humanitarian convoys to northern rural Homs were vital but must be followed up by greater access if we are to alleviate the suffering of civilians. The situation across Aleppo governorate also remains alarming for civilians. In northern Aleppo, just across the border from Turkey, the situation for tens of thousands of people is precarious, with many having been displaced multiple times this year alone as a result of heavy fighting between non-State armed groups and ISIL. That fighting is ongoing as of today and is likely to fuel further displacement and vulnerability along the border areas. In Aleppo city, fighting has continued to affect civilians over the past few weeks and also had an impact on humanitarian operations. The United Nations hub in the western part of the city has repeatedly been hit by shelling, while access for cross-border aid to assist 300,000 people in eastern Aleppo city, along Castello road, the last remaining route into the area, has been repeatedly cut due to air strikes and heavy fighting. The current reality in Syria is not something that we should or can accept. There should never be impunity for behaviour that shows complete disregard for international humanitarian law, flouts the resolutions of the Security Council, and causes such immense human suffering. One day all those responsible must and will be held to account. Despite the extremely challenging environment, United Nations agencies and non-governmental organization partners continue their tireless efforts to meet the urgent humanitarian needs of the Syrian population. Millions of people were reached with assistance in April, while UNICEF and the World Health Organization began another nationwide immunization campaign to reach 2 million children. And cross-border shipments provided food aid to over a million people, as well as other types of assistance to tens of thousands more. Cross-line inter-agency operations to besieged, hard-to-reach and other priority locations have continued, with over 800,000 people reached this year in these areas, and many more than once. We have very recently gained access to besieged eastern Harasta with food and other humanitarian supplies for 10,000 people — a first since March 2013, over three years ago. In addition, since 10 April, the World Food Programme successfully carried out 44 high altitude airdrops over the besieged city of Deir-ez-Zor. These airdrops mean that 762 metric tons of urgently needed food assistance, distributed by the Syrian Arab Red Crescent on the ground, reached approximately 100,000 people. But several weeks of air drops have brought an amount of food equivalent to only one convoy. Let me repeat that several weeks of air drops have brought an amount of food equivalent to only one convoy by road, and the Council should have no doubt about the challenges our partners are facing to deliver assistance by air. Airdrops are an option of last resort; they are costly, dangerous and technically very challenging. However, as I have said before, the gravity and scale of need means that the United Nations must consider such options, but only as a last resort, and not forgetting that the United Nations would require the approval of the Government of Syria. Deliberate interference and restrictions by the parties, notably the Syrian Government, continue to prevent effective aid delivery. For example, on 20 April, the United Nations submitted its inter-agency convoy plan for the month of May, which included requests to reach 904,750 people across 35 besieged, hard-to-reach and priority cross-line locations. The Syrian authorities granted approval in full to only 14 locations, with 224,000 people, and approvals conditional on the type and amount of assistance to another eight locations, for some 306,000 people. That effectively left more than 40 per cent of the planned target population, including in Aleppo, Al-Waer, and Talbiseh, without access to basic necessities and food. That of course leaves me extremely concerned. We recently submitted our plan for June with a request to reach 1.1 million people in 34 besieged, hard-to-reach and other priority cross-line locations, including all the places we could not reach in May. I call on the Syrian Government to approve the plan in full and to remove any and all conditions, not least regarding the amount or type of aid that can be delivered. Even for the locations that were approved for deliveries in May, the Syrian Government has severely curtailed the ability of the United Nations to reach those in need. A convoy and assessment mission to Darayya, where 4,000 civilians have been besieged for almost four years, scheduled for 12 May, had to be aborted due to unconscionable last-minute restrictions imposed by Government security forces. At the last checkpoint, Government forces removed all basic supplies, including nutritional items for infants. No conclusion can be drawn other than that this was simply an effort to further punish civilians, and this time infants. Similarly, an inter-agency convoy that was supposed to reach Mu‘addamiyah on 14 May was unable to deploy. Security force representatives never turned up at the warehouse to monitor the loading of trucks, as previously agreed, despite constant outreach at various levels. As a result, the convoy was never given permission to depart. At the same time, non-State armed groups continue to prevent a United Nations assessment mission from proceeding to the besieged towns of Foah and Kafraya in Idlib governorate. Moreover, the removal of life-saving medicines and medical supplies such as surgical, midwifery and emergency kits has continued unabated, with supplies for an estimated 150,000 treatments removed from convoys since the beginning of the year. Since the adoption of resolution 2139 (2014), medical supplies for more than 650,000 treatments have been removed from aid convoys. Such restrictions are not only violations of earlier guarantees and approvals obtained from the Syrian Government and other parties, they are deliberately and cynically designed to inflict more unnecessary suffering on civilians living in besieged and hard-to-reach locations. As the Council knows, the international community came together in Istanbul earlier this week for the World Humanitarian Summit, called for by the Secretary- General. I emphasized at the Summit that we must all live up to our responsibility, collectively and individually, to meet the needs of the most vulnerable people and make a real difference for the people who need our help most. Syria is a stark example of why the Secretary- General called for the Summit. As he has said, we are one humanity, with a shared responsibility not only to keep people alive, but to give people a chance at life in dignity. The bottom line is that, politically, we continue to fail the people of Syria dismally in that regard. On 17 May, the International Syria Support Group called on all parties to the Syrian conflict to immediately comply with the terms of the cessation of hostilities. It further called for the lifting of all sieges and urged the Syrian Government to swiftly approve United Nations delivery requests in their entirety. Frankly, the parties to the conflict, and those with influence over them, urgently need to turn this into decisive, positive action that can have a direct, positive effect on Syrian lives on the ground. However, let me state clearly that protecting civilians and granting access should never be dependent on political negotiations or as a bargaining chip for ad hoc deals on the ground. These are fundamental tenets of international humanitarian law and must be respected by the parties and all who support them. There must be access to those in need, and not just to a third of those in need, but to all; not just one-off deliveries, but sustained, immediate and unimpeded humanitarian access throughout the country; not just access to deliver vaccines, but the full package of supplies, including medical and surgical items, delivered on the basis of the needs assessments made by the United Nations. The sieges have to be lifted once and for all, and immediately. They exist today only because of a lack of will to end them. Millions of women, men and children and, as I mentioned early in my statement, Dr. Mazin — struggling for life in that bed in Reyhanli and all across Syria — each and every one of them depends on the Council’s action, right now.

I thank Mr. O’Brien for his briefing. I now give the floor to the representative of the Syrian Arab Republic.

I do not want to take much time here, but I am struck by the number of factual claims that have been made by the Ambassador from Syria that impugn the reputation of the United Nations and the brave humanitarians who are trying to get food to people who are being starved  — to death, in many cases. I think there is some irony in a Government that pulls infant formula, anaesthetics and surgical equipment off of convoys and that does not even deign to respond to successive United Nations requests, accusing the United Nations of not showing up with convoys when there are people starving. But, I am not the authority on this matter; the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs is. As such, I would like to ask Under-Secretary-General O’Brien to respond to some of the allegations made by the Syrian ambassador.

I call on Mr. O’Brien. Mr. O’Brien: As I have said on many occasions before, my only authority comes from attempts to ensure that we gather facts from the best sources possible — both with our own eyes on the ground and from those we are able to trust to produce the facts — and to relay them to the Security Council in a completely fair and honest manner. Where there are reports rather than seen facts, we make judgments about the quality of those reports. So, having laid out the best information we have available, I stand by all the facts I outlined in the statement I just made to the Council. I can certainly stand by the facts I gave early in my statement because that was my personal testimony, in particular my sitting down at the bedside of Dr. Mazin as he struggled for life, barely able to whisper. All he could muster to say was “Please, peace”. I think that sums up precisely why we need to raise ourselves above the level of disputes on the numbers, which simply do not pay sufficient respect to the deep needs of the people who are doing their very best to help or those who continue to struggle after five years of a fight that could be brought to an end if there were sufficient political will — not least from the Government, which represents an alternative factual base. I stand by the facts that I presented, and I am more than happy to write to the Council at a later stage, setting out further helpful background details.

I should simply like to raise a question with regard to procedure here in the Council, because it is my understanding that this was to be a briefing followed by private consultations. Are we going to be discussing Mr. O’Brien’s briefing in public meeting or is it going to be in consultations? If it is public, then we should begin the discussion here, but I believe that otherwise we should be conducting this discussion in closed consultations.

The President of the Council cannot prevent anyone from taking the floor, but I propose that we begin our private consultations so that we can hear from Mr. O’Brien. I give the floor to the representative of the Syrian Arabic Republic to make a further statement.

I now invite Council members to informal consultations to continue our discussion on the subject.