YouSaid · the spoken record

Lowcock

lines on the record: 570
first: 2017-09-27
most recent: 2021-06-15
sittings or episodes: 46
sources: un-security-council

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“An average of 2.9 million people were given some form of help every month. The humanitarian response plan is needs-based. Eighty- five per cent of all assistance provided reached areas of high-severity need - areas where multiple, urgent needs have converged and require a systematic and sustained response. There is also a response in areas of lower severity, including for life-saving activities, such as vaccination campaigns and nutrition screening. Some recent reports have claimed that United Nations humanitarian assistance reaches only those in areas not controlled by the Government. That is untrue. In fact, most of those reached with United Nations assistance are in areas controlled by the Government of Syria. Access to the estimated 1.1 million people in need living in areas that changed control in 2018 continues to improve.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Fourthly, on the question of whether we will pass on relevant information that we hold to the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism to Assist in the Investigation and Prosecution of Those Responsible for the Most Serious Crimes under International Law Committed in the Syrian Arab Republic since March 2011 and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, in order to support investigations into the potential violations we are seeing, the answer is yes, we will do that, subject only to the proviso that those giving us sensitive information consent to it being shared. Between January and May this year, more than 6 million people in Syria were provided with humanitarian assistance with financing provided by donors to allow us to implement the United Nations humanitarian response plan.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Another facility that is named is Ibn Sina Hospital, where the basement floors were rehabilitated with funds from the United Nations and other donors and which has been in operation since April. The letter also says that there is no ambulance network left in existence in Idlib. Members of the Council have all in recent days seen footage and photos of ambulances in Idlib, including one used to take those three little girls I talked about earlier, Rawan, Tuka and Dalia, to be treated by Dr. Abrash. The United Nations continues to support organizations operating ambulance systems in Idlib. As members are aware, medical facilities and transports are entitled to special protection under international humanitarian law, requiring steps to spare them even if they are being used for military purposes.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Thirdly, I have now seen the letter of 16 July from the Syrian authorities (see S/2019/572), which I was asked about when I last briefed the Council (see S/PV.8561). As members know, the letter says that 119 hospitals in Idlib governorate have been taken over by terrorist groups, no longer serve their original purpose and cannot be considered hospitals, health-care centres or even civilian objects. Few of the facilities referred to in the letter are named, but Maarat Al-Numan Hospital is among those that are. According to the United Nations-led health cluster, it has been functioning as a hospital since December 2014. The current operating partner, helped by the United Nations, has been supporting the hospital since April 2015, and it is still supporting it today.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“While we have received a formal response from Turkey, we have not received one from the Russian Federation. In spite of our efforts to work with parties to the conflict to prevent attacks on civilian objects and humanitarian workers, I have come to the conclusion that, in the current environment, de-confliction is not proving to be effective in helping to protect those who utilize the system. I have asked my team to meet again with the humanitarian organizations that would like their activities to be de-conflicted to update them on the current situation and again determine whether or not we should continue to provide information to the parties on new sites or humanitarian movements.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“The United Nations then shares the coordinates with the international coalition forces, the Republic of Turkey and the Russian Federation. When there is an incident on a de-conflicted site, we notify the parties and request that an investigation be undertaken. As I said to the Council last week, whether the information provided through the de-confliction system is being used by the parties to protect civilian facilities from attack or to target them for attack is an extremely important question. As members know, I have asked the Russian Federation for clarification of what it does with the information we give it. I continue to hope to receive further clarification. We have also sent notes verbales to parties to the conflict in respect of six different attacks in north-west Syria in 2019 in relation to de-conflicted locations or movements.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“I do not think so, especially because the people to whom I spoke ranged in age from 8 years old to 12 years old. They are children - little boys and girls. There are a million children just like them in that part of Syria, many forced to flee with their families from elsewhere in the country. I asked if any of them go to school. "No. It is not safe. They hit our schools." There is no shortage of information about Idlib. We all know exactly what has been happening over the past three months. Secondly, I was again asked for information on the de-confliction system. Through that system, humanitarian agencies, mainly non-governmental organizations provide information to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs to identify static civilian locations or humanitarian movements.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“I spoke yesterday by video link to two groups of displaced people in different parts of Idlib. I asked them what was happening where they were. They said, "We are being bombed every day by the Russians and the regime". I asked them what they needed. They said, "We just want the bombing to stop". "Do you feel safe?" "No. We are afraid." "What is your hope for the future?" "We just want to live in peace." We know there are people from the Security Council listed terrorist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham in Idlib who make daily life there difficult for ordinary people, but we also know that estimates suggest there are about 100 civilians for every fighter. Do the answers from the people I spoke to yesterday sound like the words of terrorists?”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Then there is information from organizations delivering humanitarian assistance, including United Nations agencies, such as UNICEF, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Population Fund and others, and the many humanitarian partners they finance. Those organizations are all financed by the Member States on a voluntary basis. Members require them to provide information on how they are spending Members' money as a basis for financing them. Some Members hire other independent bodies to double check that what the delivery organizations tell them is true. Those organizations have staff totalling thousands of people, most of them Syrians, and many of them like Dr. Abrash. Members can talk to them, too, just as I have done. Then, of course, there is the testimony ofthe people of Idlib themselves.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“There is a great deal ofsatellite imagery illustrating the impact of the fighting on towns and villages in southern Idlib over the past three months. If, for example, we compare satellite photos of Kafr Nabutha, a town in southern Idlib, taken at the end of April and then again at the end of June, which is what analysts at the Operational Satellite Applications Programme of the United Nations Institute for Training and Research - the United Nations body with capacity in that area - have done, what we see is a level of destruction consistent with a bombing campaign aimed at a scorched-earth policy. Almost every building was destroyed in a three-month period. Such satellite imagery has shown 17 entire villages almost completely destroyed and emptied.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Our partners, with Whom we have worked sometimes for many years and with whom many of the countries represented here in the Council also work, provide information. Testimony comes from those closest to the source who are assessed by the United Nations as credible. We use imagery, including satellite imagery, or geotagged and time stamped pictures of medical facilities that have been analysed and assessed by the United Nations. We see videos of explosions, destroyed buildings, scorched bodies and screaming children. We triangulate all our information. There are many other sources of information. Media organizations report extensively on what is happening. Members have all seen their reports and footage.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“President, and the Secretary General on 16 July by the Permanent Representative of Syria (S/2019/572) and, fourthly, whether we would pass on to the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism to Assist in the Investigation and Prosecution of Persons Responsible for the Most Serious Crimes under International Law Committed in the Syrian Arab Republic since March 2011 and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic the information we hold about attacks on civilians and civilian objects. First, with regard to information sources, many Council members provide us With information, which we study carefully. Information that I provide to the Council is information that is from direct or verified sources, triangulated, reviewed and confirmed. Our teams on the ground tell us what they see.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“These are civilian objects, and it seems highly unlikely, given the persistent pattern of such attacks, that they are all being hit by accident." She emphasized, "Intentional attacks against civilians are war crimes, and those who have ordered them or carried them out are criminally responsible for their actions". I last briefed the Council at its closed meeting on 18 July. I said then that I would respond today to a number of questions that Council members asked me, first, about the information sources we use to determine what is going on; secondly, an update on the de-confliction system; thirdly, about the letter sent to you, Mr.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“My office and I have now briefed Council members on the situation seven times since 29 April when the current onslaught started. Members will all have seen the statement of the High Commissioner for Human Rights issued on 26 July. Let me quote from it. "Despite repeated calls by the United Nations to respect the principle ofprecaution and distinction in their conduct of hostilities, this latest relentless campaign of air strikes by the Government and its allies has continued to hit medical facilities, schools and other civilian infrastructure, such as markets and bakeries.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“For more than 90 days now, bombing and shelling by the Government of Syria, backed by the Russian Federation, has produced carnage in the so-called de-escalation zone of Idlib. On 26 July, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights identified at least 450 civilians who had been killed since late April, including more than 100 in the past two weeks alone. We have seen continued reports of attacks killing civilians, including further attacks in the town of those little girls. Many hundreds more have been injured. More than 440,000 have been displaced. Dozens of civilians have also been killed or injured as a result of shelling by Security Council listed terrorist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham and the non-State armed groups associated with it.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Their house had been hit by a bomb dropped by a war plane. Dalia, the 9-year-old, lay on the bed behind Dr. Abrash, as we spoke While he tended to her. Everyone has seen the pictures of her two younger sisters, because they were printed on the front pages of newspapers all across the world - Rawan, a 3-year-old, buried by rubble, covered in dust and clinging on to the T-shirt of her baby sister, Tuka, in a desperate effort to stop her from falling to her death off the precipice that the bomb had made of the upper storeys of their home. Their mother, just 25-years old, and 5-year-old sister Reham were killed in the attack. Rawan, that brave little three-year-old, died of her injuries the day after the attack. She had saved her baby sister, who has now been discharged from Dr. Abrash's hospital.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Mr. Lowcock: Last Friday, 26 July, I spoke via a video link to Dr. Mohammed Abrash, a surgeon at Idlib Central Hospital. Trained in Aleppo, he has been a physician for 28 years, and since 2011 he has been in Idlib. Dr. Abrash told me he is afraid. He has a room at the top of the building. He says the lower floors and basement are the safest places, so that is where the patients are. A few days before I spoke to him, a bomb landing 50 metres away blew out all the glass and windows of his room. A day or so before that, another bomb had hit a gynaecological facility 200 metres away. Dr. Abrash's hospital is deconflicted under the United Nations system. Everyone knows where it is. I spoke to Dr. Abrash because two days prior, on 24 July, three young sisters were taken to his hospital by emergency ambulance.”
2019-07-30 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8589 (2019) · source
“Last year, with funding provided under the United Nations response plan, humanitarian agencies implemented a major country-wide campaign against cholera. The effect was to reduce the number of cases to 380,000 for the whole year. That is, of course, still a very high figure, but it is also a huge improvement over 2017, and it was achieved despite substantial further degradation of water, sanitation and health facilities caused by the war. Those gains have now been lost. So far this year, nearly 500,000 cases of cholera have been reported. We have received reports so far of more than 700 deaths as a result, including more than 200 children. The death toll will surely grow.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“In Sana'a, a United Nations-supported treatment plant that purifies water for agriculture has also started to shut down. That means that up to 4 million people could soon be eating vegetables irrigated with dirty water, making them more likely to contract cholera. In the next two months, United Nations agencies expect to close 21 more key programmes. In August, that could mean, for example, an end to shelter services for more than 800,000 displaced people, as well as an end to reproductive health services available to 1 million impoverished women. We already see the impact of those cuts in the fight against cholera. The Council will recall that, in 2017, more than 1 million suspected cases of cholera were reported. Many experts called that the world's worst-ever cholera epidemic.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“Even after accounting for suspended programmes in Sana'a, WFP is reaching more than 11 million people, which is more than we have previously reported. But the situation is different across the rest of the relief operation. Last month, I told members of the Council that support to medical facilities was being suspended in some areas (see S/PV.8561). Suspensions are now disrupting services of health facilities that serve 9 million people. Agencies are starting to suspend some regular vaccination programmes targeting 13 million people, including 200,000 infants. Work on 30 new feeding centres in areas with the worst levels of hunger has also been halted. Up to 60 existing centres could close in the coming weeks, putting at least 7,000 malnourished children at immediate risk of death.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“At the High-Level Pledging Event for the Humanitarian Crisis in Yemen, for this year's humanitarian response plan, which the Secretary- General convened in February - six months ago - donors pledged $2.6 billion. Twenty-seven of the 40 donors who pledged have paid more than 75 per cent of their pledges, and 20 of those donors have paid 100 per cent, and in some cases even more. But those who made the largest pledges - Yemen's neighbours in the coalition * have so far paid only a modest proportion of what they promised. As a result, the response plan is currently just 34 per cent funded, compared, as I said, to 60 per cent this time last year. So what are the consequences of that? Well, there are not yet major consequences for emergency food aid led by the World Food Programme (WFP), as David Beasley will detail.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“Fuel is essential to power generators at hospitals, to pump water and to run sanitation systems. Any mechanism to regulate those imports risks worsening the humanitarian situation. Let me be clear that although access challenges are pervasive, they are not stopping the world's largest aid operation. I cannot say the same of the third point in the resolution, which is funding. At this time last year, the humanitarian response plan was 60 per cent funded. Substantial, flexible funding early in the year - mainly from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates - allowed the aid operation to scale up across all sectors at a critical time. That unquestionably saved millions of lives.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“The United Nations assessment team had planned to deploy to the tanker next week, but the necessary permits remain pending with the Ansar Allah authorities. Discussions to resolve this as quickly as possible continue. I would like to note that this is additionally frustrating when one recalls that the same authorities wrote to the United Nations early last year requesting assistance with the tanker and promising to facilitate its work. In Government-controlled areas, coalition forces continue to impose bureaucratic requirements on humanitarian agencies trying to travel up the west coast from the south. That policy frequently delays assistance for people in those areas. The Government is also moving to introduce new regulations on commercial fuel imports.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“The Council will hear shortly from David Beasley about the difficult decisions that has forced on the World Food Programme (WFP). But the obstacles go far beyond WFP. In April and May, humanitarian agencies reported 375 access incidents across the country, some across Government-controlled areas, but mostly in areas controlled by Ansar Allah. During that time, Ansar Allah-affiliated authorities detained more than 180 trucks carrying humanitarian cargo and held them for an average of 36 days before they were released. Ansar Allah authorities also continue to delay a United Nations technical assessment of the decaying FSO SAFER oil tanker, which, as I have told the Council many times before, threatens to spill up to 1.1 million barrels of oil into the Red Sea.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“There are many other examples from more than 30 active front lines across the country. Ansar Allah forces have also continued drone and missile attacks on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which have killed and injured civilians, as well as damaged civilian infrastructure. Those attacks are reprehensible, and they are universally condemned by the international community. As Martin Griffiths said, urgent steps are needed to de-escalate the violence. For months, I have called for a nationwide ceasefire that would end fighting in Yemen and attacks on neighbouring countries. Let me turn now to progress on the Council's call for unhindered humanitarian access. Ansar Allah-affiliated authorities in the north continue to hinder humanitarian assistance in areas they control through bureaucratic impediments and interference.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“In Ad Durayhimi, a civilian was killed by a landmine, and in Al-Tuhayat, sniper fire killed a child. And in May and June, war planes carried out at least six air strikes across Al-Hudaydah. As Martin Griffiths just said, hostilities in Al-Hudaydah have now subsided again and relative calm has returned, but violence continues elsewhere. At the end of June, air strikes reportedly hit a private home in Taiz, killing seven family members, including four children. Shelling also struck an aid distribution point in Taiz, killing four civilians and injuring two more. In Al-Dhale'e, we continue to receive reports of indiscriminate shelling affecting front-line villages. And in Al-Bayda, clashes in Rada'a killed one civilian and injured three last week, while shelling in another area injured a civilian and damaged family homes.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“Since June, 120,000 more people have fled their homes, bringing total displacement this year to more than 300,000 people, on top of the millions forced to flee in earlier years. We have seen renewed conflict in Al-Hudaydah governorate, despite the governorate-wide ceasefire agreed in Stockholm. Two weeks ago, artillery fire and heavy clashes gripped several neighbourhoods in Al-Hudaydah city, damaging private homes, an abandoned hospital and other civilian sites. One civilian was killed and four injured when shells hit a local mosque. Seven children were injured in a separate shelling incident. Conflict also flared south of the city. In Al-Khawkha district, shelling struck a site hosting displaced families, injuring three children and destroying a water tank.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“Mr. Lowcock: Inresolution 2451 (2018) ofDecember 2018, the Security Council offered unequivocal support for the humanitarian relief operation in Yemen. Specifically, the Council called for, first, respect for international humanitarian law; secondly, unhindered humanitarian access; and thirdly, more funding for the United Nations response plan. The Council also noted the link between ending the conflict and alleviating people's suffering. Unfortunately, the Council's calls have not been heeded. As I said last month (see S/PV.8551), conditions for most people in Yemen are getting worse, not better. And if the current trajectory continues, we should all expect that they will continue to get worse. The fighting rages on.”
2019-07-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8578 (2019) · source
“We have come back to the Council again and again to tell members about the latest horror facing civilians and the failure of the parties to implement their basic obligations. I repeat our call again today. Ease the suffering. Save lives. End the fighting. Obey the law.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“We have seen a few positive developments in access from Damascus, with a recent mission to Al-Hol in the north-east, and recent approvals to deploy to areas of Dara'a in the south and Abu Thohur and Sinjar in south-east Idlib. But I continue to call on all parties to allow safe, sustained and unimpeded access to all locations in need at all times throughout Syria. Week after week, month after month, year after year, the Council has been briefed on the humanitarian suffering in Syria. We have repeatedly pleaded for the protection of civilians in order to ensure humanitarian access and the parties' full compliance with their obligation to respect international humanitarian law and international human rights law.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“I am increasingly concerned about the situation in southern Syria, where, following reports of rising tensions between Government forces and local groups since May, conflict threatens to reignite. The humanitarian response continues to face access challenges across the country. During the period covered by the Secretary-General's latest report (S/2019/508), access was limited in Raqqa city and east of the Euphrates river in Deir-ez-Zor, including in the Hajin enclave, mostly due to widespread explosive-hazard contamination, and some areas in the south of the country, as well as in eastern Ghouta, were not sustainably accessible, owing to administrative restrictions.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“No woman or newborn should be left alone without the support of specialized health practitioners, especially during childbirth. While there have been some positive reports of children of foreign nationality being repatriated, thousands more foreign nationals in the camps still face an uncertain future. I call on all Member States to take the measures necessary to ensure that their nationals are repatriated for rehabilitation and reintegration, or prosecution, as appropriate, in line with international law and standards. I also call on the parties on the ground to facilitate the voluntary return or resettlement of internally displaced Syrians at the camp.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“While aid is being delivered by humanitarian organizations to areas that people coming out of Rukban are returning to, we have also requested approval to visit them in the areas where they are currently residing, and while access to the shelters has been a welcome development, the request of 30 May for such visits is still awaiting approval. In Al-Hol camp, in north-eastern Syria, humanitarian agencies continue to respond to the needs of the nearly 73,000 people in the camp, which continue to be considerable in the areas of health, water, sanitation and hygiene, among others. At the same time, we continue to be concerned about restricted humanitarian access to the annex, where 11,000 foreign nationals are living. In recent weeks, we have received numerous reports of women giving birth alone in their tents at night.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“We also continue to provide assistance to the more than 14,800 civilians who have left the camp over the past months and are now at transit centres or places of destination. The Syrian Government approved a third United Nations visit to the shelters at transit centres, which occurred on 18 June. Conditions in the shelters remain adequate, and the process for moving on from the transit centres is relatively swift. Most people have left the transit centres for southern and eastern Homs, and those originally from Palmyra are also starting to receive authorizations to return there.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“In Rukban, along the Syrian-Jordanian border, some 27,000 people remain in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. Inadequate basic services are costing lives, as attested by the widely reported death of a young woman and her child while giving birth in the camp on 5 June. Deaths like those are preventable if the proper care can be provided. We continue to call for humanitarian access to Rukban in order to be able to deliver life-saving aid and to assist those who would like to leave the camp The last request for access to Rukban, sent to the Government of Syria on 9 May, was not approved. Another request is being prepared. In the meantime, the United Nations is working with the Syrian Arab Red Crescent on an operational plan for another convoy immediately, should authorization be given.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“We have also consulted with humanitarian organizations operating inside Idlib that are running medical facilities there. At their request, we will continue to run the de-confliction system in Idlib for the organizations that want to report their coordinates to us. But I want to make clear that this does not mean that it is our judgment that the de-confliction system in Idlib is, in practice, protecting medical facilities. I am not sure that it is. More can be done to strengthen the system. But the critical question is what those receiving information on the location of medical facilities are doing with that information. I will keep the Council informed. In addition to the north-west, we are also following the humanitarian situation in other parts of the country with concern.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“That means not directing attacks against them and avoiding incidental harm to them. The de-confliction system aims to help parties to the conflict fulfil those obligations. It provides the parties, including the Russian Federation * and, through it, the Government of Syria - as well as Turkey, the United States and other members of the international coalition forces with the coordinates of medical facilities and other humanitarian sites to help those parties take precautions to spare them. I have briefed the Council, including in detail on 17 May and again last week on 18 June, on how medical facilities and other civilian objects inside Idlib have been impacted by the conflict. In the light of that, I have written to the Russian Federation to request information as to how the details provided through the de-confliction mechanism are used.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“On 20 June, an ambulance transporting an injured woman in Maarat Al-Numan was hit, killing the woman and three medical workers. Two paramedics were seriously injured. We must see an end to such attacks on medical workers, transport and facilities. We must see hospitals like Maarat National Hospital protected. Last week I told the Council (see S/PV.8553) that I would update it today on the conclusions I had reached on the impact of recent events on the de-confliction system in Idlib. I briefed the Council in detail on 17 May (see S/PV.8527) about the de-confliction system and how it works. Let me remind the Council of the purpose of that system. All parties to conflict - States and armed groups - are obliged under international humanitarian law to protect medical facilities and other humanitarian sites in the conduct of hostilities.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced. One of the areas coming under regular attack is Maarat Al-Numan, in southern Idlib. Humanitarian partners working in the health sector have been warning that they are particularly worried about Maarat National Hospital. It has reportedly been hit before in previous years. At peak times, the hospital treated about 20,000 people a month. It is now operating under emergency conditions. But it remains the main referral hospital in southern Idlib. While operating in a conflict zone and in an area under the control of a Security Council-listed terrorist organization, they keep their life-saving services going with the support of humanitarian organizations. There is serious reason to worry.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“Despite efforts to introduce a ceasefire in the north-west, hostilities continue unabated. Fighting among Syrian Government forces and their allies, armed opposition forces and the Security Council-listed terrorist organization Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham continues to impact civilians every day. Over the weekend of 21 to 23 June, we received reports ofair strikes affecting more than 55 communities and artillery shelling affecting more than 21 communities in Idlib, Hama and Aleppo governorates. At least 32 civilians, including women and children, reportedly died, and others were wounded, in air strikes and artillery shelling in southern Idlib. Over the same period, a further seven people, including a child, were reportedly killed and others were injured as a result of air strikes and artillery shelling in northern rural Hama governorate.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“Mr. Lowcock: This is the fifth humanitarian briefing on Syria we have provided the Security Council in the past eight weeks. Week after week, we have highlighted the impact of the hostilities in the north-west. I do not want to repeat everything we have so often told the Council. Let me simply quote the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, as she summarized the situation yesterday. She said her Office had "received reports of hundreds of ongoing civilian casualties and destruction to civilian infrastructure, including hospitals and schools, mainly caused by air strikes by the Government of Syria and its allies, but also, to a lesser extent, ground-based attacks by armed groups". We have repeatedly asked the Council to make that stop. It has not stopped, or even slowed.”
2019-06-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8561 (2019) · source
“Just as the Secretary-General said earlier, international humanitarian law must be upheld and attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure need to stop - and they need to stop immediately.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“A number of partners now feel that supplying geographical coordinates to be given to the warring parties effectively paints a target on their backs. Some have drawn the conclusion that hospital bombings are a deliberate tactic aimed at terrorizing people. This whole episode raises deep questions about the deconfliction system. We are discussing this internally, and I will tell the Council what our conclusions are at the regular monthly humanitarian briefing next week. Security Council-listed terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham has a significant presence in Idlib, and it is responsible for its own share of the suffering there. Countering Hayat Tahrir al-Sham is plainly a major challenge. But counter-terrorism efforts cannot, in any way, absolve States of their obligations to uphold international humanitarian law. That is the bottom line.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“Many other hospitals have closed out of fear ofbeing attacked. Those attacks do notjust claim innocent lives. They also deprive thousands of civilians of basic health services, even as fighting intensifies around them. As the Council is aware, some of those hospitals had been deconflicted through the Organization's deconfliction mechanism. All parties have specific obligations under international humanitarian law to refrain from attacking protected sites, regardless of whether they have been deconflicted or not. It is appalling that those sites were hit in the first place, but hitting a facility whose coordinates were shared as part of the Organization's deconfliction system is simply intolerable.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“To this day, we continue to receive reports of attacks impacting civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals. Since April, according to reports, 37 schools have been affected. More than 250,000 children are out of school, some 400,000 students have had their exams cancelled, and 94 schools are currently being used as shelters. As a UNICEF representative said last week, no parent should fear sending their child to a school that may be bombed later that day. I need to remind the Council again of the incidents affecting health facilities. Twenty-six incidents affecting health-care facilities in north-western Syria have been confirmed by the World Health Organization since late April - eight more than when I last briefed the Council. Two of those facilities were located in an area controlled by the Government of Syria.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“In addition, the United Nations and its partners have reached nearly 800,000 people with general food assistance. Water, health and sanitation supplies have been distributed to some 180,000 displaced people, and water trucking has been made available to people in some 342 camps and informal settlements. Incidentally, none of that would have been possible if the Council had not renewed resolution 2165 (2014). Cross-border assistance remains the only means of reaching people in and around Idlib. The United Nations and the brave humanitarian workers on the ground are doing all they can. They are risking their lives to help others. But the response is stretched, and a further increase in need brought on by additional fighting would risk seeing it overwhelmed.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“Many are crowding into basements, seeking refuge from air strikes, volleys of shells and mortar rounds, and fighting that continues to threaten what is left of their homes. Hospitals, schools and markets have been hit. Power stations have been affected. Crops have been burned. Children have been forced out of their schools. We had reports this morning of another 19 people killed yesterday by air strikes and artillery shelling. And this past weekend civilians were killed by mortar and rocket attacks in the Al-Wadihi area, south of Aleppo. In short, we are facing a humanitarian disaster unfolding before our eyes. There is no denying the facts. The United Nations and its partners have been responding with emergency food assistance through ready-to-eat rations, reaching more than 190,000 people in May.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“An estimated 330,000 people have been forced to flee their homes since 1 May and have moved northward towards the border with Turkey. That is almost double the number of newly displaced people since my previous briefing to the Council (see S/PV.8527). A recently conducted rapid assessment found that many of them have moved multiple times since the start ofthe conflict, some as many as 10 times. That is a particular feature of the Idlib area. People fled there initially from other parts of Syria, then moved again and again, constantly searching for safety. Camps for the displaced are overcrowded, with many people forced to stay in the open. Those who remain in towns and villages close to the fighting live in constant fear of the next attack.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“Mr. Lowcock: Security Council members will all have heard what the Secretary-General said earlier today, which Rosemary DiCarlo also just referred to. Like Ms. DiCarlo, I briefed the Council one month ago on the worsening humanitarian situation in Idlib (see S/PV.8527). Ten days later, my deputy alerted the Council to further violence and destruction (see S/PV.8535). Violence, involving Syrian Government forces and their allies, armed opposition forces and the Security Council-listed terrorist organization Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, continued throughout the holy Eid al-Fitr period. It has still not stopped, despite the announcement of a truce on 12 June. The conduct of hostilities has resulted in more than 230 civilian deaths over the past six weeks, including 69 women and 81 children. Hundreds more have been injured.”
2019-06-18 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8553 (2019) · source
“The film ends as he embarks on a peaceful, satisfying future. There is a lesson here for our own time loop as well. Nothing will change in Yemen unless everyone is ready to do things very differently. The steps I have outlined are the way to start. Otherwise, Council members can expect more of what they have been hearing for the past four years: more fighting; more death; more destruction; more hunger; more disease; more appeals; more pledging conferences; and more briefings like this one.”
2019-06-17 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.8551 (2019) · source