UN Security Council extends critical aid to northern Syria

The UN Security Council has voted unanimously to keep a key border crossing from Turkey to Syria’s rebel-held northwest open for critical aid deliveries for another six months, Qazet.az reports.

In a surprise move, Syria’s ally Russia supported the resolution during Monday’s vote.

Authorisation by the 15-member council is needed because Syrian authorities did not agree to the humanitarian operation, which has delivered food, medicine, shelters and other aid to opposition-controlled areas of Syria since 2014.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said after the vote that cross-border humanitarian operations “remain an indispensable lifeline for 4.1 million people in northwest Syria”.

The vote, the UN chief stressed, “comes as humanitarian needs have reached the highest levels since the start of the conflict in 2011 with people in Syria grappling with a harsh winter and a cholera outbreak”, according to his spokesman Stephane Dujarric.