Transcription du point presse de l'Envoyé spécial pour les Nations Unies, M. Staffan de Mistura, M. Jan Egeland, Conseiller spécial de l'Envoyé spécial des Nations Unies pour la Syrie après leur entretien avec le Groupe de travail sur l'accès humanitaire en Syrie (en anglais)

SdeM - Good afternoon. I think I have said all what I needed to say yesterday night or early morning, but you will see it is obviously linked to the discussions we have had now at the special meeting we just ended. So I will give the floor to you Jan, in order to focus on what we discussed and on where is the whole connection with my message yesterday is reflecting on the humanitarian aspect as well. Thank you very much.

JE - thank you very much Staffan. As a humanitarian worker and as Chair of this taskforce of the ISSG on humanitarian access, I could not in any way express how high the stakes are for the next hours and days. The stakes are so incredibly high because so many civilian lives are at stake. So many humanitarian health workers and relief workers are being bombed, killed, maimed at the moment, that the whole lifeline to millions of people is now also at stake.

We did today at the taskforce review progress since the Munich meeting this year up until April. For the first time we can see that more than 50 percent of the people in besieged areas have been reached, once or numerous times since the beginning of the year -- 52 percent altogether. 255,000 people in the besieged areas alone had been reached compared to the last four months of last year where we reached three percent. Hardly anybody in all of the besieged areas, ten thousand people, have been reached in the last four months of last year.

So there has been progress. All of that may now be lost if the war continues as it is now, if the fighting and the violence and the bombardment of civilians, of help workers, of hospitals, of relief workers continue.

The vaccination effort for two million children that has been ongoing and has been successful so far, will also be at stake. We need to get to 2 million children three times in order to avoid an epidemic in Syria.

The May plan that was submitted a week ago to the Syrian government, we are expecting an answer back today on clearances and permits to go to the 35 places that we’ve asked to reach.

There are 905,000 people in these besieged and hard to reach places. May could still be our best month. It could be the month where we reach a higher number than any previous month but it could also be a catastrophic month. It all depends on what will happen in the next hours and days and weeks.

Perhaps a special word on the catastrophe, which is medical assistance. Medical assistance has a crisis of its own. The medical workers have been particularly hard hit and hard targeted.

Final point on the medical assistance crisis within the crisis; no single area has been harder hit than medical assistance work. Doctors have been killed, health workers have been killed, and medical workers have been blocked from coming to their patients. Still medical supplies are being taken off convoys and it is not just the famous surgical and trauma kits, even basic health kits, anaesthetics, mental health medicines, scissors for midwifes, kids’ vitamins have been taken off.

In the midst of the war deepening, we now see that five white helmet workers were killed, the last child doctor in eastern Aleppo has been killed, hospitals have been bombed. What we basically see is that while people are bleeding, the help workers are unable to do the work because they cannot do the work and because they are attacked.

Two convoys of the UN took place in the Homs area last three days. One of them was hit by a mortar, another one had to stop several times because there were air raids on the road and in the places they went to.

Now if this continues, we will not be able to undertake the ambitious May plan and we will not be able to reach the people of Syria.

Q - Could you elaborate more if possible to the May plan that you submitted to the government and about the 35 cities that you would like to reach? Are they new cities or cities that have already been reached? And could you also give us some figures about your targets for the month of May -- you said that you have reached 255,000 people till now, what is the target for the month of May, if it is to become a good month?

JE - The May plan is for us to reach 100 percent of the besieged areas, of which we have reached 52 percent so far. We asked to go also to Duma, east Harasta, Darayya, plus where we haven’t had any access so far. But also to the three areas which are Irbin, Zamalka, and Zabadani, where we have not yet agreed with the government about the number of beneficiaries. So all of the areas are on the list, in addition to all of the hard to reach areas altogether 905,000 people in 35 locations to be reached by Inter-Agency humanitarian convoys.

Q. You mentioned the ongoing difficulties, but overnight and in the last 24 hours we heard, according to our reports, that 61 people have died including 27 people in an MSF hospital. How can you expect that the humanitarian aid that you hope to continue to be able to ship in will continue when - as you mentioned - in Homs a mortar shell hit one of your convoys just the other day, how can this continue? And if you could please address the situation in Aleppo.

JE. The catastrophic deterioration in Aleppo during the past 24/48 hours, also in the Homs area was reported live to the members of the ISSG today. No one doubted the severity of the situation and now no one is uncertain about the consequences. So what I am saying is that the life line for hundreds of thousands if not millions of people that have had hopes that things could get better now, that life line may be broken. Can it be repaired? Yes it can be repaired, because to me it is not dissimilar to what we had in February and the end of January when it was as bad as now, bombardments all over.
So the appeal of Staffan de Mistura to the United States, to Russia and to the other powers in the ISSG is: you did it once, you can do it again, because now even more is at stake because people have really even less possibilities to sustain another crisis like now.

Q. You mentioned that the deteriorating situation in Aleppo was reported live to the ISSG, so what are they doing? Are they sitting on their hands again or what are they doing?

JE. What was good to hear was that all of the countries represented promised to follow up with their respective sides so we hope they will do that. And we hope that it will be real pressure on the parties, on those who bomb, on the men with guns, who are actually playing with the lives of women and children, civilians and the wounded. I hope that we can have another Munich moment and another Munich turn from the very dark moments that we are now again experiencing for better days.

Q. I believe that it is difficult, even for us as journalists, to disassociate between the humanitarian track and the political track. Don't you think that you should decide on those who are responsible for violations that are taking place on the ground that cut off medical assistance and to assign who is responsible for those violations?

JE. The accountability must be there, really. For what the government is doing, the government has to be responsible for, what Hezbollah is doing, Hezbollah has to be responsible, what other armed opposition groups do, they have to be accountable really and it is going to be clear soon who did what. What we humanitarians have no stand on is on who should win or what kind of political solution there should be but indeed those who violate humanitarian law should be held accountable and we will not hesitate to hide who is doing what.

Maybe I can just end by one small glimmer of positive news in this darkness. You will remember that Deir ez-Zor was the place where we really could not reach, week after week I had to report, no we were not able to do the air drops. Today there were 2 air drops in a day. The World Food Programme has now done 15, and there are large distributions inside Deir ez-Zor and we are reaching now soon everybody with food rations for civilians in Deir ez-Zor. So in a way it shows things can be done when there is goodwill and when we are not prevented from reaching people. I hope we can soon report the same for the areas where we haven’t reached at all including Darayya, Duma and east Harasta. I hope we will be able to reach them as well.

Q. Mr. O’Brian said the other day that in Darayya there were 4000 civilians, is that the assessment or understanding of the UN? Was that done by the UN? Two weeks now almost since that mission was undertaken, do you have any more details on the nutrition status of the children and other civilians who are left? And what are you hearing from the government on getting access with convoys that carry goods?

JE. It is still our best assessment that there are 4000 civilians in Darayya. Our colleagues saw 500 school children with their own eyes, so many women there, many civilians. The nutrition situation is very bad, the health situation is very bad, there are acute needs for medical evacuations for people who are sick and wounded in Darayya. It is part of our May plan and I hope that the answer will be 'yes you can go to Darayya' because we can now refute the allegations that we heard from some government delegations that there are only fighters and terrorists in Darayya. We have seen by our own eyes, very many children, many civilians so I hope we will be able to serve those.
Thank you very much.