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UN Calls for End to Idlib Carnage

Lisa Schlein

   GENEVA - The United Nations is appealing for $500 million to provide
   humanitarian, life-saving assistance for 1.1 million civilians trapped
   in a war zone in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib.

   More than three million civilians are trapped in Idlib. Nearly
   one-third of this population or about 900,000 people have fled their
   homes over the past two months in search of a safe haven. But the
   United Nations says there is no safe haven in Idlib.

   It says the ferocity of the military onslaught by Russian-backed Syrian
   government forces to regain this last rebel stronghold is forcing
   people to flee into an ever-smaller piece of land near the Turkish
   border. Deputy Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for the Syrian Crisis,
   Mark Cutts, calls this a major protection crisis.

   "The fighting is now coming dangerously close to the area where more
   than a million are living in tents and makeshift shelters," he said.
   "It is an extremely alarming situation because if airstrikes and
   shelling move any further into that area, we are no doubt going to see
   a real bloodbath, a real massacre of civilians in that area."

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