Syria aid waits at Turkish border as bickering goes on

CILVEGOZU/BEIRUT: Two convoys of aid which crossed the Turkish border destined for Syria’s Aleppo city were waiting in no-man’s land on Wednesday, as disagreements

CILVEGOZU/BEIRUT: Two convoys of aid which crossed the Turkish border destined for Syria’s Aleppo city were waiting in no-man’s land on Wednesday, as disagreements between warring sides and fears about security delayed deliveries on the third day of a ceasefire.

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Russia called for a 48-hour extension of the Syria truce it brokered with the United States last week and said rebels had violated the ceasefire 60 times since it came into force on Monday.

The aid convoys, each of around 20 trucks carrying mostly food and flour, entered Syria from the Turkish border town of Cilvegozu, about 40 km west of Aleppo, on Tuesday but could go no further than the Turkish customs post.

The international community’s first goal since the truce came into effect is to get aid to Aleppo. The city, Syria’s biggest before the civil war that broke out in 2011, is now divided, and its rebel-held area is besieged by government forces.

“Things are taking longer than we’d hoped,” David Swanson, spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told Reuters. He said 20 UN trucks were waiting at the border “ready to go”.

Disagreements between the warring sides were blocking aid getting into opposition-held eastern Aleppo, Swanson added. “Some groups are looking to gain political mileage out of this, and this is something we need to put aside,” he said.

The UN envoy for Syria said if the cessation of hostilities holds there may be a meeting of the coalition of some 20 countries trying to end the conflict on the sidelines of next week’s gathering of world leaders at the UN in New York.