France calls for urgent preparations for Syrian airdrops

The UN says a total of 592,000 people live under siege in Syria – most surrounded by government forces – and another four million in hard-to-reach areas.

U.N. aid chief Stephen O’Brien told the Security Council the world body would on Sunday ask Syria to approve airdrops or airlifts of aid into besieged areas where only partial or no land access had previously been granted, said French U.N. Ambassador Francois Delattre, president of the council for June.

The Syrian government insisted Thursday there is no need for the United Nations to airdrop food supplies in besieged parts of the embattled nation because “no one” is starving.

Speaking on Wednesday, UK Foreign Minister Philip Hammond said: “On the day of that deadline, the Assad regime has cynically allowed limited amounts of aid into Daraya and Mouadamiyeh, but it has failed to deliver the widespread humanitarian access called for by the global community”.

Also speaking to the press was Ramzy Ezzeldin Ramzy, UN Deputy Special Envoy for Syria, who highlighted that the latest meeting of the humanitarian task force was important and useful. “This includes preparing a clearance request for submission by the Humanitarian Coordinator to the Syrian authorities”, WFP said. About 600,000 people are believed to live in besieged areas.

“I don’t think there is something imminent”, he cautioned. There has been some positive movement in terms of humanitarian access yesterday and the expectations there will be some more positive developments in the next few days, but of course we have to wait and see, he said.

A truce allowed a convoy to enter the town of Daraya near Damascus for the first time since late 2012, while another entered the nearby town of Moadamiyeh for the first time since March.

But the delivery was small – and contained no food.

“We need the consent of the Syrian government and all necessary security guarantees, in order to conduct airdrops”, he added.

De Mistura pointed out last week that it can take six weeks of air drops to deliver the same amount of aid to an area as a single convoy over land. But access by road has been repeatedly rejected by the Assad government and its forces manning checkpoints.

United Nations has already been air dropping aid from high altitudes to 110,000 people besieged by ISIS fighters in Deir al-Zour. “I think that’s quite clear”, Ramzy said.

“Airdrops are complex, costly, risky, but we have now all agreed that they are the last resort and we must use them to relieve the human suffering in so many besieged areas in Syria”, he said.

Vitaly Churkin, the United Nations ambassador of Assad’s close military ally Russian Federation, suggested Russia was not necessarily opposed to airdrops.

“Daraya needs everything”, said an activist there.

This comes as the UN Security Council discusses plans for aid to be air-dropped to areas under siege, following calls by the US, UK and France.

While Syria’s government let the United Nations deliver some aid for the first time in four years to the rebel-held Damascus suburb of Daraya this week, it was “too little, too late”, according to Matthew Rycroft, the U.K.’s ambassador to the UN.

These bombs are used by the Assad regime and consist of barrels packed with explosives.

“In Daraya, we reckon there will be around 4,000 people only left at the moment but that is women, children, people in great need”. Turkey has also shut its border.

About 4000 people in the besieged Darayya suburb of the capital Damascus have been without food aid since 2012. It called on Turkey and Europe to open their borders to these refugees. A suicide bomb attack killed at least one person and wounded another three in the regime stronghold of Latakia in northwestern Syria, state television said.