UN Says Aid Convoy Reaches Syria's Besieged Homs' Waer

Geneva, 12 Ramadan 1437/1 June 2016 (MINA) – An aid convoy carrying food, medical supplies and other emergency supplies for 37,500 people has reached Waer, a suburb of the Syrian city of Homs, U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA spokesman, Jens Laerke, said Friday.

“The convoy to Al Waer was completed late last night and the team has returned safely to their base,” he said. A second convoy, to supply the rest of the estimated 75,000 people in Waer, is planned in the next few days, WAM reported, as quoted by Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA).

A separate convoy, to Afrin in northern Aleppo, had also gone ahead but a delivery to the Damascus suburb of Kafr Batna had not, due to “last minute logistical complications.”

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The U.N. hoped it would proceed in the next few days, Laerke said.

Meanwhile, Riad Hijab, coordinator of the opposition High Negotiations Committee, said al Waer, the only part of Homs city not under government control, was on the brink of humanitarian disaster, and blamed the U.N. for capitulating to the government’s “siege and starvation tactics”.

“Al Waer’s residents have come under enormous pressure – because of dire humanitarian conditions, bombardment and starvation imposed by the Assad regime – to agree to a local truce.

“The United Nations Damascus office has helped the regime enforce the terms of this truce”, he said in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. (T/R07/R01)

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Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)