BAB AL-SALAMA: An aid convoy entered Tuesday rebel-held north Syria from Turkey, the first through Bab al-Salama crossing that reopened for UN relief after last week’s earthquake, the United Nations said.
The crossing had been closed for UN aid since 2020, under pressure at the UN Security Council from Syrian regime ally Russia, calling instead for all relief for the war-torn country to enter via government-controlled areas.
Paul Dillon, a spokesman for the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration, told AFP in Geneva that “11 IOM trucks” entered through “the newly-opened Bab al-Salama border”.
This was confirmed by an AFP correspondent at the crossing.
Dillon said the convoy was loaded with essential humanitarian assistance including shelter materials, mattresses, blankets and carpets.
“UN cross-border aid is a lifeline,” tweeted UN humanitarian affairs chief Martin Griffiths.
The first UN aid delivery to rebel-held areas after the quake entered through the northwestern Bab al-Hawa crossing on Friday. Griffiths said a total of 26 trucks had crossed.
The 7.8-magnitude earthquake on Feb 6 has killed at least 35,000 people and devastated swathes of Syria and neighbouring Turkey.
Syrian government officials and emergency services in rebel areas put the death toll in the country at more than 3,600.
Over the past three years, Bab al-Hawa remained the only border crossing still open for international aid into parts of Syria outside government control, down from four in 2014.
Bab al-Hawa had been the only way UN assistance – part of an aid operation authorised by the UN Security Council nearly a decade ago – could reach civilians without passing through government-controlled areas.
But on Monday, UN chief Antonio Guterres said Damascus had allowed the United Nations to use again Bab al-Salama and Al-Raee crossings to deliver aid.
The two crossing points on the Turkish border would be used for an initial period of three months, Guterres said.
They are controlled by Turkish-backed rebels in the northern province of Aleppo who have been using it for trade with Turkey and for military purposes.
Activists and emergency teams in Syria’s northwest have decried the UN’s slow response in the quake’s aftermath in rebel-held areas, contrasting it with the planeloads of humanitarian aid delivered to government-controlled airports.
On Tuesday, a first UN delegation visited the rebel-held northwest since the quake.