In its seventh year of war, Syria is suffering from the worst humanitarian crisis on the planet, with around 500,000 of its residents dead, 5 million made refugees, and some 80 percent of its population now living under the poverty line.
And the bloody civil war between the autocratic regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and anti-regime forces has created an entire generation of children who have grown up to the blasts of bombs and shells and who know nothing but war.
Moreover, while the West is sending hundreds of millions of dollars to help Syrians cope with the crisis, experts say this money does not always reach those who need it the most.
“Our help is a drop in the ocean,” said Nickolas Hawton, a diplomatic adviser for the International Committee of the Red Cross speaking, during the “Averting Humanitarian Catastrophe” panel at the Kyiv Post’s “Bringing Peace to Syria & Ukraine” conference on June 18.
Hawton, whose organization has provided assistance to Syrians for decades, added that the key to dealing with the humanitarian crisis is to find a political solution to the conflict.
Mohammed Alhammadi, the head of a coalition of local Syrian non-government organizations that assist Syrian people in need, said the Assad regime withholds aid to people who live in areas that are not under the government’s control.
He gave as an example the residents of Eastern Ghouta, a formerly opposition-controlled area in outskirts of Damascus, whose 400,000 residents had to live for five years under siege. While the government eventually forcibly evacuated the majority of the residents from Eastern Ghouta in March, the remaining 100,000 people there are still cut off from any assistance.
“There’s no hostilities anymore in Eastern Ghouta. Why don’t we have access there?” Alhammadi said.
Alhammadi also showed the pictures of a hospital he used to work in Syria, which was totally destroyed during the war. He also showed a picture of another Syrian doctor — whom he called Dr. Ali — who had been working in an underground hospital when he was killed in a chlorine gas attack by Assad’s forces.
Wael Aleji, spokesman for Syrian Network for Human Rights, said the Syrian war had led to a huge number of war crimes, and the number increased massively when Russia intervened in the conflict in 2015.
“Since Russia intervened in September 2015, 6,200 civilians have been killed in Russian attacks,” he said.
“Over the last few years the number of civilians killed by Russia has exceeded the number of civilians killed by ISIS.”
Aleji said his organization had recorded violations of human rights by all the sides of the conflict, but the greatest number of the human rights abuses, including torture, rape and forced disappearances, were committed by Assad’s forces.
Aleji said he believes that the European Union, which for years saw Syria as a sphere of Russian influence, should become more decisive and impose targeted sanctions against the businesses of the country’s dictator Assad, his family, and his cronies.
“They continue to do business in Spain, the United Kingdom, and France. Something has to be done obviously,” Aleji said, adding that Assad’s corruption was costing the lives of Syrian people on both sides of the conflict.
Alhammadi added that Ukraine, a country that has also become a target for Russian aggression, should “stand along with the Syrian people” against their mutual attacker.
