Aid enters besieged central Syria town

An aid convoy for besieged civilians entered a rebel-held town in central Syria on Wednesday for the first time in a year, the Red Cross said.

In the third such aid operation in Homs province this week, the Red Crescent and International Committee of the Red Cross was delivering food parcels to 12,000 families in and around Talbisseh, ICRC spokesman Pawel Krzysiek said.

The 35 trucks will also ferry in medicines, delivery kits for pregnant women and equipment to fix water boreholes and pumping stations, he said.

The delivery to the area besieged by government forces is the ICRC's first in three years and the Red Crescent's first in a year.

Talbisseh and surrounding areas -- controlled by rebels since 2012 -- are home to 60,000 people, half of them displaced by fighting.

Another 14 trucks are expected to reach the area in coming days, Krzysiek said.

The delivery follows two relief operations to the nearby town of Rastan, including a convoy last Thursday that ferried the largest aid consignment to date in war-torn Syria.

More than four million people live in besieged or hard-to-reach areas in Syria with little or no access to food or medicines.

Syria's conflict erupted in March 2011 with anti-government protests but has spiralled into a complex war that has killed more than 270,000 and displaced millions.

Source :AFP