Hundreds of sick, wounded children need to leave Aleppo

The UN reiterated Thursday its call for an immediate ceasefire in Aleppo, warning that as many as 500 sick and injured children desperately needed to be evacuated from besieged areas.

"There has to be a pause," Jan Egeland, head of the UN-backed humanitarian taskforce for Syria, told reporters in Geneva, pointing out that civilians at the moment had little chance of escaping the besieged part of eastern Aleppo.

"At the moment, those who... try to escape are caught in crossfire, they are caught in shelling, (and) risk being hit by snipers," he said.

"Several hundred children, sick and wounded... need to get out."

Thursday's taskforce meeting had been told that between 100 and 500 children had been identified as needing medical evacuation, he said.

But Egeland voiced little optimism that the various combatants in Syria's complex conflict and their main international backers, Washington and Moscow, would be able to reach the agreement needed to halt the carnage in Aleppo.

- 'Poles apart' -

Thursday's taskforce meeting had been "difficult", he said, "because the member states that are supposed to help us get access to civilians in the cross-fire are poles apart in how they regard what's happening in Syria".

The Norwegian diplomat acknowledged that he had never been "in my many, many years of humanitarian negotiations in as difficult negotiations and as frustrating talks, that produced nothing in spite thousands of contacts with all of the parties".

His comments came after a blistering three-week offensive in which Syrian government forces have seized about 80 percent of east Aleppo, a stronghold for rebel groups since 2012.

The increasingly cornered opposition factions are calling for an immediate five-day humanitarian ceasefire, and the United States, Britain and France have also called for a truce, warning of a "humanitarian catastrophe".

But Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government has said a truce is only possible after a full rebel withdrawal, something opposition fighters have rejected.

At least 384 civilians have been killed in east Aleppo during the offensive, while rebel fire into the west has killed at least 105 people over the same period, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The assault has prompted a mass exodus from east Aleppo where at least 80,000 people have fled their homes, according to the monitor, while those who remain in the besieged areas are in desperate need of aid.

Egeland said the Syrian government had for the first time authorised UN access to the besieged part of eastern Aleppo, but said doing so would be impossible without a halt to the fighting.

He said aid workers had enough food supplies for 150,000 people ready and waiting in western Aleppo, but could not bring them to eastern Aleppo without a pause in the fighting.

He also called for "a better protection system" for the people leaving the besieged areas, pointing to unconfirmed reports that some people are being arrested, mistreated or are having their ID cards confiscated as they flee. 

Source: AFP