Edited News | UNHCR , UNITED NATIONS
Syrian refugees resort to ever more desperate measures to resist pandemic impact
The COVID-19 crisis has put another 200,000 Syrian refugees in need of emergency assistance in the last three months alone, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday, in an appeal for funding to confront new challenges posed by the health emergency.
Now well into its 10th year, the Syrian conflict has created more than 5.5 million refugees seeking shelter in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.
“The number of vulnerable refugees who lack the basic resources to survive in exile has dramatically surged as a result of the public health emergency,” said UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic. “The refugee-hosting communities in countries in Syria’s neighbourhood experience similar hardships. Many refugees have lost what were already meagre incomes, forcing them to cut down on the most basic needs, including food and medication.”
Since pandemic lockdown measures were implemented in these countries, Mr. Mahecic explained that UNHCR has seen “in addition to the families that have already been identified as vulnerable, another 200,000 refugees just in this period of three months who because of the impact needed emergency assistance”.
Clear signs of distress among vulnerable individuals who have lost their jobs include coping measures “that would allow them to somehow make ends meet”, he added. “We have evidence of people trying to skip meals in order to spread out the food so it can last longer, they may skip taking medication, anything that is considered right now something where they can cut costs.”
Citing the urgent need for additional support to sustain humanitarian initiatives, Mr Mahecic explained that in Jordan, only 17,000 out of 49,000 newly identified vulnerable families received help, “as UNHCR is lacking the funds to extend its programmes”.
Prior to the pandemic, the majority of Syrian refugees in the region were living
below the poverty line, according to the UN agency, while a recent survey in Jordan showed that only 35 per cent of refugees said they had a secure job to return to after the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions.
More than six million internally displaced Syrians and other vulnerable groups remain inside Syria, according to UNHCR.
Before the onset of the virus, the agency’s $5.5 billion Syria Refugee Response and Resilience Plan 2020 appeal was only 20 per cent funded across the region. It is now updating its requirements to cope with additional needs and has appealed for strong international support to countries sheltering those in need.
“Host communities have shown great solidarity, but they have also suffered loss of livelihoods as a result the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Mr Mahecic, adding that nine in 10 Syrian refugees in the region live in towns or villages and not in camps.
Beyond the immediate emergency, the UNHCR spokesperson highlighted the need to ensure that refugees were included in countries’ national public health responses to COVID-19, in addition to other basis services, including education.
“It is a very important point that the refugees, internally displaced, stateless people are included in the national public health responses,” he said. “Only if everybody’s being looked after and everybody’s safe, we can all be safe.”
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
“Deadly attacks on distraught civilians trying to access the paltry amounts of food aid in Gaza, are unconscionable. For a third day running, people were killed around an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. This morning, we have received information that dozens more people were killed and injured,” Jeremy Laurence UN Human Rights spokesperson said at the biweekly press briefing in Geneva.
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Edited News | OCHA
Gaza ‘hungriest place on earth’ with aid stymied – UN humanitarians
Starving Gazans continue to be deprived of aid as international relief efforts are being severely constrained by the Israeli authorities, the UN humanitarian affairs coordination office OCHA said on Friday.
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Edited News | OCHA , UNRWA
As a controversial United States and Israel-backed aid distribution plan gets underway in Gaza, the UN called on Tuesday for an “immediate surge” of its own pre-positioned supplies to help prevent starvation.
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Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Office Spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani today urged Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to reject a bill that was recently endorsed by parliament allowing trials of civilians in military courts. The Uganda People’s Defence Forces Amendment Bill 2025, which was passed on 20 May and now awaits presidential signature to become law, among others broadens the jurisdiction of military courts, authorising them to try a wide range of offences against civilians.
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Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Seif Magango today warned of a further deterioration in the human rights situation in South Sudan at the bi-weekly briefing in Geneva.
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Edited News | OCHA , WHO
Syria: ‘Staggering’ needs amid insecurity, health care crisis - UN humanitarians
Millions of people in Syria continue to face mortal danger from unexploded munitions, disease and malnutrition and urgent support is required, UN humanitarians said on Friday.
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Edited News | UNRWA , OCHA , WHO
UN life-saving aid allowed to trickle into Gaza as civilian needs mount
Amid calls for more humanitarian trucks to enter the food and medicine-deprived Palestinian enclave of Gaza, UN humanitarians have received permission from Israel for “around 100” more aid trucks to cross into the Strip after only five were let in yesterday, But the scale of relief efforts allowed remains entirely insufficient to meet the urgent needs of people there, humanitarian workers say.
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Edited News
A war reporter from Lebanon who lost a limb in the line of duty is calling for an end to impunity for attacks against journalists.
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Edited News | ITU
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) commemorated 160 years dedicated to connecting the world on Saturday, 17 May in Geneva, Switzerland, during the annual World Telecommunication and Information Society Day.
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Edited News | WHO , OCHA
Gazans ‘in terror’ after another night of deadly strikes and siege
Amid reports that Israeli strikes across Gaza into Friday killed at least 64 people, aid teams once again pushed back strongly at allegations that aid is being diverted to Hamas and pleaded for the blockade to end.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
Deportations over recent months of large numbers of non-nationals from the United States of America, especially to countries other than those of their origin, raise a number of human rights concerns, the UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk warned on Tuesday.
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Edited News | WHO
Gaza: Over 50 child malnutrition deaths amid aid blockade; entire generation will be ‘permanently affected’ - WHO
In the aid desert of Gaza, malnourished children are dying while survivors can expect a lifetime of dire health problems, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday.