Devastating earthquake needs swift aid response

The cataclysmic earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria could not have hit a more vulnerable region

AFP

A Syrian child sits on a collapsed building in the town of Azaz on the border with Turkey on February 7, 2023, following a deadly earthquake.

Devastating earthquake needs swift aid response

Charles Lister

last update on 08 Feb 2023

The earthquake that struck southern Turkey and northern Syria in the early hours of Monday morning could not have hit at a worse time or targeted a more vulnerable region.

Decades of shoddy construction in Turkey left thousands of buildings tumbling to the ground, and in northern Syria, more than a decade of brutal conflict left many structures entirely defenseless.

AFP — People search for survivors in Diyarbakir, on February 6, 2023, after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck the country's south-east.

Forty-eight hours later, nearly 8,000 people were confirmed to have died and tens of thousands more wounded, with those numbers likely to rise many times over. Some estimates suggest as many as 180,000 people may still lie under rubble in Turkey.

In the wake of such a cataclysmic disaster, the international community is mobilising. Planeloads of aid and disaster relief experts are landing in Turkey, and the Syrian regime has received pledges of aid from Russia and seven Middle Eastern governments.

Idlib forgotten

As has so often been the case, however, the hardest hit Syrian community, in the opposition-controlled northwest, appears to have been forgotten.

Home to over 4.5 million people, nearly 3 million of whom are displaced, this is an area of Syria that has borne the brunt of 12 years of the regime’s scorched earth campaign.

Home to over 4.5 million people, nearly 3 million of whom are displaced, this is an area of Syria that has borne the brunt of 12 years of the regime's scorched earth campaign. At least 65% of the area's basic infrastructure was already destroyed or heavily damaged before the earthquake. Scenes there resemble something from the apocalypse.

At least 65% of the area's basic infrastructure was already destroyed or heavily damaged before the earthquake. Scenes there resemble something from the apocalypse.

For two days, around 2,500 volunteer White Helmets rescue personnel have heroically worked around the clock, desperately seeking to rescue people from the rubble. Many have been saved, but a great many remain buried.

Reuters — The White Helmet volunteers rescue a child from under rubble, in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake, in Jandaris, Syria February 8, 2023.

The White Helmets were set up to respond to individual air strikes, not a catastrophic earthquake. Yet they are the primary responders in northwestern Syria and so the revelation that after 48 hours, their well-known leader Raed al-Saleh had not yet been contacted by a single UN official came as a shock to many. Rightfully so.

Nightmare scenario

Worse still, not a single ounce of aid or assistance has been able to get into Syria's northwest and its 4.5 million people. Prior to the earthquake, almost all residents of the northwest were dependent on foreign aid delivered to them through one border crossing with Turkey, at Bab al-Hawa.

That aid has also now stopped, due to heavy damage to the primary road to the border, as well as damage to UN aid facilities in southern Turkey and deaths and injuries to UN aid personnel.

Worse still, not a single ounce of aid or assistance has been able to get into Syria's northwest and its 4.5 million people. Prior to the earthquake, almost all residents of the northwest were dependent on foreign aid delivered to them through one border crossing with Turkey, at Bab al-Hawa. That aid has also now stopped.

The lack of everyday humanitarian assistance and any disaster relief response is truly a nightmare scenario.

Sensing their vulnerability, Syria's ambassador to the UN has announced the regime's willingness to receive international aid intended for all Syrians, but only on the condition that it comes to Damascus first.

This aligns with the regime's long-term agenda: to put an end to cross-border aid and prioritise only cross-line deliveries from the Syrian capital.

To an outside observer, this might sound like a feasible alternative, but the regime has spent 12 years systematically weaponising, manipulating, diverting and corrupting aid in Syria.

Moreover, cross-line aid pales in comparison to the scale of cross-border aid. In 2022, the few cross-line deliveries permitted by the regime amounted to only 0.5% of the enormous cross-border effort in Syria's northwest.

The international community can urgently deliver disaster relief into the opposition northwest, but only if it truly wants to.

While Bab al-Hawa is currently challenged by the lack of passable roads, two other crossings exist at Bab al-Salameh and Jarablus, where the West has provided aid in the past.

This would require a unilateral aid effort, without channeling through the UN mechanism — but it can be done. If it is not entertained, then we may only now be scratching the surface of the tragedy meted out on the area.

In 2022, the scale of illegal Syrian migration into Europe rocketed by 100%. Our inaction will only fuel a far, far greater scale of refugee flows in 2023.

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