The UN on Friday called for “unhindered humanitarian access” to people fleeing the last pocket of Islamic State militants in eastern Syria.
US-backed forces in the area said that they had asked for help from the UN after securing safe corridors for tens of thousands to flee the fighting.
In the past week alone, the UN says that more than 10,000 people have fled from the conflict zone to Al-Hol, where the main camp for people displaced by the fighting against the Islamic State is.
“Humanitarian actors have collectively requested forces in control of the area to designate a transit site en route for Al-Hol where life-saving assistance can be provided,” said Andrej Mahecic, spokesman for the UN refugee agency (UNHCR).
So far the request “remains unanswered,” he told journalists in Geneva.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, who control the area around Al-Hol, said that they had never received such a request from the UN.
“On the contrary, we have long expressed our position that we need assistance, especially UN aid to support us on this issue, which is beyond the capability of the” Kurdish authorities, Syrian Democratic Forces spokesman Redur Khalil told reporters.
In Al-Hol, “there is malnutrition, a lack of medical supplies, tents, and blankets,” Khalil said.
Over the past month, the Syrian Democratic Forces secured the exit of 20,000 Iraqis — mostly women and children — from Islamic State-held territory, as well as hundreds of Syrians and non-Iraqi foreigners.
Backed by a US-led coalition, the Syrian Democratic Forces are battling the last shreds of the “caliphate” near the town of Hajin in the Euphrates River valley.
The UNHCR says families fleeing the Hajin enclave describe a harrowing journey, “wading through mine fields and open fighting.”
Once reaching the Syrian Democratic Forces positions, “they describe being herded into open trucks and having to endure another arduous journey in winter weather northward to Al-Hol camp. Little or no assistance is provided en route to the hungry and cold people, the vast majority of whom are women and children,” a UNHCR statement said.
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