Sixteen million Syrians need humanitarian assistance after 13 years of civil war, almost three-quarters of the population. A need that did not disappear after the collapse of the regime last Sunday, December 8. But international NGOs are hopeful of being able to deliver this aid more easily throughout Syria, according to Olivier Routeau, head of operations at Première Urgence Internationale.
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RFI: The world has changed in Syria with the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. It’s been a little less than a week now. What can we say about the humanitarian situation at the moment? What are the needs?
Olivier Routeau : Indeed, it is an absolutely major change in situationsudden, brief and absolutely monumental. At the country level, what we can say is that we must first remember the humanitarian situation that existed before this change. The reality is that there were 16 million Syrians in need of humanitarian assistance. And this reality, despite the immense hope generated by this change of regime, has not changed. It is both an objective situation today, but it is also an immense challenge for the new authorities and ultimately for all the actors present in Syria, to be able to continue to ensure access to these services, to these fundamental needs for the populations, while facing a State in an extremely complicated situation. The economy is on the ground, there are services to get back up and running, a banking system to restore, and a lot of issues to overcome. It’s going to be a super important race against time for the new authorities to avoid a deterioration of the situation.
These 16 million Syrians will surely be joined by the return of Syrians who had fled the country for many years. What does this engender?
This is obviously a dimension that will add complexity to this return challenge. It’s already been 14 years since the Syria is materially devastated, with many towns destroyed. What will be the reception conditions for these refugees who wish to return? There is a fundamental challenge for this return to be secure, dignified and feasible. If all the refugees returned tomorrow morning, it would obviously be totally impossible. We will have to organize this return for those who wish it, and it must be voluntary. This echoes certain ongoing discussions in European countries, but also in neighboring countries which host the majority of refugees. What is certain is that many of them will want to return home, which is perfectly normal. It will be a challenge for the authorities and for humanitarian actors to be able to welcome them and allow them to access essential services when they return. We must also not forget that, beyond the refugees, there was an extremely large number of displaced people, around a million people who were displaced in just 15 days. There are already very significant movements on the ground, particularly in the Aleppo region where more than 500,000 people are on the move, and across the country, there are nearly a million people. We are only at the beginning, so this challenge is monumental. It is absolutely necessary to support this development and facilitate the work of humanitarian actors to ensure access to essential services: health, water, food for the populations.
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How are you currently organizing yourself?
Our teams have been on site for decades. We have more than a hundred employees in Syria today. Right now our job is to reorganize our relations with the new authorities, who were not present in the areas where we operated. Another part of our work is to readjust our programs. These were until now adapted to a situation that is now obsolete and it is a matter of readjusting them according to new priorities. These priorities are directly linked to access to essential services according to the needs of the populations: those who were already present, those who are moving, those who are arriving and those who will come. We therefore operate in an emergency context in the face of population movement. Finally, coordination is another fundamental aspect of our work. This new situation allows humanitarian actors who could not operate in Syria to now do so. This is good news, but the humanitarian sector must organize collectively to manage this development. For Première Urgence Internationale, this also allows us to deploy in new areas and meet existing needs.
Now that Bashar al-Assad is gone, will Syria now be able to benefit from more international aid?
I strongly hope so. Syria was already economically exhausted, and beyond the regime, which was obviously dispossessing and kept the Syrian populations in extreme poverty, Syria as a state is the subject of sanctions by the international community. These sanctions greatly harm the ability of the State to recover and function, and they hinder humanitarian actors in their interventions. There are therefore issues to consider on how to facilitate, in terms of resources, the transfer of money and the resources allocated to Syria, but also on the regulatory framework which will allow humanitarian actors to operate effectively. This framework is essential, because it will not only address immediate essential needs, but also launch a project for the redevelopment and reconstruction of Syria. This process is in fact the only guarantee to ensure stabilization and a peaceful situation in the long term.
Concretely, what have you been unable to do until now because of the situation in Syria, because of the regime, and which you now have the hope of being able to do on the ground?
Intervene everywhere in Syria. Which was not possible before, because there was a real score. Either we were in areas controlled by the old regime, or in those controlled by opposition groups. This limited the scale and effectiveness of our overall response. Now, with access to the entire Syrian territory, which is being negotiated with the new authorities, this allows for a more complete and more coordinated response. A second aspect is linked to the limits that we ourselves imposed, due to the regime, which sought to control humanitarian aid as much as possible. For reasons of independence, we could not accept that aid be used by the regime. This limited some of our capabilities. In this new context, we hope to be able to expand and make our assistance more relevant. Finally, there were limitations due to international sanctions, which restricted our ability to transfer funds and import humanitarian, medical or non-medical equipment. These obstacles to our effectiveness should, with the new situation, fade away.
Have you already had initial contacts with the new authorities in Damascus?
It is a phase that is underway, both on a collective and individual scale. This involves organizing the coordination framework for humanitarian actors with these new authorities. Meetings are being planned, and each actor is seeking to understand the administrative framework that these new authorities will put in place. Even though part of the territory was already under state control, there were humanitarian actors working there. We therefore already knew this operating framework. It is a relatively classic framework, with authorization given to actors to operate, and monitoring of actions carried out, put in place by the authorities. Rather, we are reasonably optimistic that we can operate effectively.
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