ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A second UN official on the Syria file has announced he is leaving his post next month, “exhausted” by the enormous challenge of promoting peace and humanitarian aid in the more than seven-year-long conflict.
“I’ve done this work, leading the humanitarian task force, for nearly three years. There’s been too many setbacks. We have failed more often than we have achieved what we wanted,” said Jan Egeland, chair of the UN task force on humanitarian access in Syria.
His announcement that he will step down from the post a day after UN special envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura made a similar revelation is just “coincidence,” Egeland told reporters in Geneva on Thursday.
A Norwegian diplomat, Egeland also heads up the Norwegian Refugee Council and said handling the two portfolios was “exhausting.”
Despite the fatigue, Egeland tried to strike an optimistic tone and made an appeal for more space for diplomacy rather than the use of military might in Syria.
“Give time, give time for the sake of civilians,” he said.
Egeland was grateful that Russia and Turkey were committed to the Idlib buffer zone and to leaving the window open for more negotiations in order to fully implement the deal, despite resistance from some armed groups on the ground.
“We have now had five weeks without any air raid. I can’t remember such a period for the last three years in Idlib,” said Egeland. “It is a welcome calm.”
While there have been no airstrikes, the conflict monitor Syrian Observatory for Human Rights noted the regime had fired heavy machine guns, targeting areas in the buffer zone.
Under the deal, opposition fighters and jihadists in Idlib had until October 10 to remove heavy weapons from the buffer zone. Members of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) have not evacuated, however, according to the Observatory.
Turkey and Russia said on Tuesday that they will go ahead with the plan despite the missed deadline.
“That is a great relief to us, because if one is to follow a military logic that has too often been followed in war alone, it would be horrific news, not only for civilians but also for humanitarians of whom there are 12,000 colleagues in Idlib,” said Egeland.
Looking to the east where the Kurdish-led SDF, backed by the international coalition, are battling ISIS in the Hajin area, Egeland said some 15,000 people – civilians and ISIS fighters with their families – remain in the area.
“Civilians are caught in the crossfire,” he said, and those who do flee are often out of reach of aid organizations.
Egeland reminded combatants on all sides of the conflict that humanitarian law still applies in the war against terror, “it’s not like there is another set of rules.”
He had a similar reminder for humanitarian workers and donors, calling out nations that have stated they will not provide aid to areas under regime control: “Let’s agree – we do humanitarian rehabilitation and we do it all over Syria.”
“I’ve done this work, leading the humanitarian task force, for nearly three years. There’s been too many setbacks. We have failed more often than we have achieved what we wanted,” said Jan Egeland, chair of the UN task force on humanitarian access in Syria.
His announcement that he will step down from the post a day after UN special envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura made a similar revelation is just “coincidence,” Egeland told reporters in Geneva on Thursday.
A Norwegian diplomat, Egeland also heads up the Norwegian Refugee Council and said handling the two portfolios was “exhausting.”
Despite the fatigue, Egeland tried to strike an optimistic tone and made an appeal for more space for diplomacy rather than the use of military might in Syria.
“Give time, give time for the sake of civilians,” he said.
Egeland was grateful that Russia and Turkey were committed to the Idlib buffer zone and to leaving the window open for more negotiations in order to fully implement the deal, despite resistance from some armed groups on the ground.
“We have now had five weeks without any air raid. I can’t remember such a period for the last three years in Idlib,” said Egeland. “It is a welcome calm.”
While there have been no airstrikes, the conflict monitor Syrian Observatory for Human Rights noted the regime had fired heavy machine guns, targeting areas in the buffer zone.
Under the deal, opposition fighters and jihadists in Idlib had until October 10 to remove heavy weapons from the buffer zone. Members of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) have not evacuated, however, according to the Observatory.
Turkey and Russia said on Tuesday that they will go ahead with the plan despite the missed deadline.
“That is a great relief to us, because if one is to follow a military logic that has too often been followed in war alone, it would be horrific news, not only for civilians but also for humanitarians of whom there are 12,000 colleagues in Idlib,” said Egeland.
Looking to the east where the Kurdish-led SDF, backed by the international coalition, are battling ISIS in the Hajin area, Egeland said some 15,000 people – civilians and ISIS fighters with their families – remain in the area.
“Civilians are caught in the crossfire,” he said, and those who do flee are often out of reach of aid organizations.
Egeland reminded combatants on all sides of the conflict that humanitarian law still applies in the war against terror, “it’s not like there is another set of rules.”
He had a similar reminder for humanitarian workers and donors, calling out nations that have stated they will not provide aid to areas under regime control: “Let’s agree – we do humanitarian rehabilitation and we do it all over Syria.”
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