Aid officials say conditions in Syria are dire months after the quake

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Three months after a massive earthquake struck Turkey and Syria, living conditions remain dire in rebel-held northwest Syria, according to aid officials who visited the area Wednesday.

The February 6 earthquake killed more than 50,000 people, including more than 6,000 in Syria, according to the United Nations, and displaced hundreds of thousands of people.

The Idlib governorate in northwestern Syria is home to about 4 million people, many of whom were displaced earlier during the country’s 12-year civil war, which claimed nearly half a million lives.

Since the earthquake, some 2,000 trucks have crossed the border from Turkey, providing assistance such as shelter, food, medical supplies and other services, said David Cardin, the UN’s deputy regional humanitarian coordinator for the Syria crisis.

“We have made progress since the early days but there is still more to be done,” he said, citing financing as one of the issues. Although the flash appeal is fully funded and $400 million has been raised, he said the Syria Humanitarian Response Plan, which was in place before the earthquake and required billions of dollars in support, is only 7% funded.

Cardin urged that the border crossings between Turkey and Syria be opened after the earthquake for three months to allow the entry of aid open.

“We want to continue using these crossings for as long as possible,” he said. The three-month period ends in mid-May and it remains unclear whether the Syrian government will allow aid to flow in the future.

Cardin said the February earthquake left more than 4,500 people dead in northwestern Syria and damaged or destroyed the homes of some 855,000 people.

Before the earthquake, some 2 million people in Syria needed assistance, including 1.8 million people living in camps, said Patrick Motai, shelters coordinator for the UN refugee agency. Of those, about 800,000 are in tents that need to be replaced.

“The earthquake has exposed the population to more vulnerabilities,” Motiei said, adding that 1.1 million people in Syria need shelter. The immediate plan is to help the hardest hit with “dignified shelters, a mid-range type of shelter that offers better privacy, security and structural stability”.

Idris Al-Rasheed, who heads operations in northwest Syria from the WHO office in Gaziantep, southern Turkey, said more medical equipment will be brought into Syria, which will reduce the demand for transporting critically ill patients to Turkey for treatment along closed roads and across borders. . It has been closed since the earthquake.

Associated Press writer Basem Marwa in Beirut contributed to this report.

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