damascus/BEIRUT: The UN appealed yesterday for $1.5bn to help Syrians fleeing the fighting, warning that the number of refugees in neighbouring countries could double to a million by June.
“The conflict has become increasingly brutal and indiscriminate and has exacted a heavy toll,” the UN’s humanitarian affairs agency said in a statement.
“The violence in Syria is raging across the country,” Radhouane Nouicer, regional humanitarian coordinator for Syria, told reporters in Geneva. “There are really no more safe areas where people can flee,” he added. “The magnitude of this humanitarian crisis is undisputable.”
Talks were under way yesterday aimed at removing both rebel and pro-government fighters from a Damascus Palestinian refugee camp after deadly clashes, a Palestinian relief official said.
“Palestinian organisations that have remained neutral are overseeing talks between the (rebel) Free Syrian Army and Syrian troops, to keep the camp out of the conflict,” the relief official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “So far, the talks have been unsuccessful,” he added.
Under discussion is a plan to put the Yarmuk refugee camp in the south of the Syrian capital under the control of “neutral” Palestinian officials.
At least half of the camp’s population of more than 112,000 have fled in recent days in the face of deadly clashes between pro- and anti-Damascus groups.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday urged the international community to help Palestinian refugees fleeing the fighting to enter the West Bank or Gaza.
Palestinians have been divided over the 21-month uprising against the rule of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, who is from the Alawite offshoot of Shias but whose regime has long given shelter to hardline militant factions.
According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, there are 486,000 Palestine refugees living in nine official and three unofficial camps across Syria. “Yarmuk camp is a place of asylum, a refuge for Palestinians, and no parties to the conflict should be allowed in,” another participant in the talks said.
“The Syrian army has deployed additional reinforcements to the edges of Yarmuk camp, as it prepares to enter, while troops have blocked the roads... in order to safeguard the security of citizens,” pro-regime daily Al-Watan reported. Until last weekend, Yarmuk had provided refuge for hundreds of Syrian families forced to flee their strife-torn towns and cities for the capital.
But on Sunday, warplanes waged their first air strike on Yarmuk since the start of Syria’s conflict, killing at least eight civilians. Violence has since raged in the camp. Backed by anti-regime Palestinian fighters, rebels have expelled most pro-Assad fighters from Yarmuk, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. “The camp is now nearly empty of its residents,” an activist who identified himself as Rasim said via the Internet.
“It’s a real humanitarian catastrophe,” said another resident.
Agencies
