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UN Syria envoy not ‘giving up’ as Ghouta reels

1 March 2018, 4:17 pm
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BEIRUT — The United Nations envoy for Syria is insisting that a government-led assault on eastern Ghouta must not devolve into a “copycat” of the bloody siege on northern Aleppo in late 2016.

UN and other aid officials are facing an inability to get humanitarian assistance into the rebel-held region east of Damascus and escort out the critically sick and injured despite a UN Security Council resolution passed over the weekend calling for a 30-day ceasefire.

The envoy, Staffan de Mistura, says: “We cannot afford to have the luxury of giving up. So any type of feeling that the UN is frustrated: Forget it.

“Otherwise, (this) becomes a copycat of Aleppo,” he says.

— AP

This photo provided by the Syrian Civil Defense White Helmets, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows an injured man sitting inside a Civil Defense van after airstrikes hit near Ghouta, a rebel-held suburb near Damascus, Syria, on February 28, 2018. (Syrian Civil Defense White Helmets via AP)

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