By Janet Ekstract
ISTANBUL- In a press briefing at the United Nations on Tuesday, the UN chief’s Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric discussed relief efforts in Turkiye and Syria since two devastating earthquakes hit a region covering 10 provinces in Turkiye and in northwest Syria on Monday. Dujarric said that U.S. disaster mobilization teams were in Adana on Monday and would move to other locations on Tuesday. He pointed out that there are 1.7 million Syrian refugees living within the 10 provinces that were affected not just Turkish citizens. He also said that 57,000 Palestinian refugees were impacted by the quakes in northern Syria as well. Dujarric added that the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) is providing a multitude of supplies in Syria along with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) so that “families have access to clean water.” He said the focus is on child protection, working to reunite kids with their families and provide psychosocial aid.Dujarric said the goal for UNICEF is to fill in all the gaps on supplies and that the organization has so far sent emergency supplies for medical needs, foodstuff and other essential equipment. UNICEF is coordinating with the nutrition response and delivering essential health services, the UN spokesperson said. He reiterated how the UN operates in such situations by commenting: “We have a mandate given to us by the Security Council, we follow those procedures.” When Dujarric was asked about whether humanitarian aid was able to get to affected areas, he explained that the Bab al-Hawa border crossing is intact but that the road leading to it was damaged by the quake. He explained that’s why delivery of humanitarian aid has been disrupted. Dujarric said: “We are working on doing another crossline shipment as soon as possible. What I can assure is that we have always and continue to respect the territorial integrity of Syria and will continue to respect the mandate of Syria.”
In terms of how difficult it will be to get the money needed for such a massive relief effort, Dujarric commented: Dujarric said the $25M initially coming from the UN for the relief effort is to kickstart the response and that much more will be needed. As Dujarric explained: “The money is there. There is a lot of money in this world, we’re going to need more people to give more money to help the millions of people who have been impacted. The way the system is set, we need to go out and ask for money. We will do that. We will need states and organizations to pony up.” He explained that “there’s still a lot of chaos, people are spending a lot of time doing search and rescue.” Dujarric added that the secretary-general had a “very good meeting with the Syrian Permanent Representative and I have no doubt all parties involved will do their utmost to get humanitarian aid to those who need it.” The most crucial, Dujarric emphasized is to “ensure things are done safely.” He added: “We will move as fast as possible, there’s goodwill on all sides. You’re dealing here with a catastrophe on top of a humanitarian crisis that already existed.”
