Syria aid plan censored by Assad regime points to UN corruption

'Besieged and extremely hard-to-reach areas contain millions of people living under starvation and disease.'

The United Nations have been accused of allowing Assad's regime to censor key points from a Syria aid plan.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - BuzzFeed reported the UN consulted with the Assad regime and altered a humanitarian aid plan for Syria.
The original draft clearly notes that pages 17, 22, 23 and 42 have been altered to delete words such as "besieged," "Indiscriminate and targeted attacks on civilian areas and facilities," "de-mining," "conflict" and the number of attacks made on a medical facility.

The final draft replaces the word "conflict" with "crisis" and excludes other vital information.One UN insider told BuzzFeed, "Besieged and extremely hard-to-reach areas contain millions of people living under starvation and disease. If this is not prioritised within the humanitarian response, then what are humanitarian agencies really doing?"
A senior NGO member who took part in the production of the report explained, "It completely downscales the suffering and scale of the need in those areas. That's what's worrying about a lot of the changes - they were politically motivated changes that were just accepted."
An alliance of Syrian NGOs wrote a letter to Stephen O'Brien, the UN undersecretary for humanitarian affairs to express their alarm.
The letter included that the regime "should be treated as a party to the conflict and should not exert any greater influence over the humanitarian response than any other party."
The Syria Humanitarian Response Plan, which will allow $3.1 billion global aid appeal, was originally written by UN teams and NGOs working in Syria.
Despite the important differences, the UN said the suffering of people trapped in besieged areas was "horrifying," but that the Assad regime needed to be consulted because "as humanitarians we have to continue to talk to all the parties in this conflict."
The UN insider told BuzzFeed, "It's laughable that they [the UN] think they're being impartial. I think they're more concerned with being neutral at a very superficial level."
Faki Hakim, of the Syrian NGO Alliance, stated: "It is a matter of accountability to our own people, because they are all expecting us when describing the humanitarian situation in the country to say clearly who is actually suffering and from what.
"So when you are removing all of that context and providing a sterile document, of course there will be consequences in the longer term. Madaya is not the only place; there are other places under terrible besiegement for three years and we should try and find a solution, otherwise there will be other Maday as in the future." A spokesman for the UN released a statement claiming the report was "finalised in consultation with a range of partners including the Government and it is a normal practice ... as humanitarians we have to continue to talk to all the parties in this conflict to obtain access. Our focus must be on making sure all the people in desperate need in Syria receive the assistance they need to survive."
Let's pray assistance will come despite the strong censorship of the aid plan.

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