Nødhjælp kun givet til ens egen gruppe og/eller egne tilhængere – det er en af anklagerne mod den del af indsatsen for borgerkrigsofrene inde i Syrien, som de internationale organisationer ikke forestår.
ISTANBUL, 12 November 2012 (IRIN) – Syrian activists say opposition groups are manipulating humanitarian aid for political and security gains, after similar accusations were leveled against the Syrian government last week.
With over 2,5 million people in need of assistance in Syria, committees of volunteers are providing food and medical assistance in areas not reached by the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC), international aid agencies and local charities.
The committees collect monetary donations and aid from local businesses and overseas donors. But activists close to the operations say partisan interests (særinteresser) affect the flow of aid and who it reaches.
“Everyone supports their own people, in order to increase the strength of those people’s loyalty,” said Mahmoud*, an activist from Aleppo, who worked with the Arabic-Kurdish Relief Committee until fleeing to Turkey in October.
“The Syrian opposition in exile should be the link between donors and Syrians inside the country,” he said, adding:
“But sadly, each faction has a group of supporters inside Syria, and they do not help anyone except their own group.”
Delivery itself is “part of the problem”
In areas where fighting is continuing, the committees are forced to rely on Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters to get assistance to where it is needed, defying (hvilket afviger fra) the humanitarian principle of neutrality: that humanitarian actors not be engaged in the conflict.
“We depend on them a lot. There are many areas the aid committees cannot get into, because the fighting is still ongoing. For example, in Salah Al-Din [a neighbourhood of Aleppo], only fighters can deliver aid,” said Mahmoud.
Daoud Suleyman, an FSA fighter from Ma’rat Al-Nu’man, denied that FSA militias distribute aid on a partisan basis.
“In the battle of Ma’arat Nu’man, 70.000 people were displaced. Among them were children of `shabiha’ [pro-regime gangs] and people who were with the regime,” he told IRIN.
“We gave them food as we gave it to the children of the revolutionaries. We took their injured and treated them in field hospitals in liberated areas,” he said. His claims could not be independently verified.
Donors say it is hard to track where the aid goes once it is in the hands of militias.
Oubay Akil, a Syrian who runs a medical equipment company in Texas, has been sending orthopaedic kits into Syria through Turkey since August. He told IRIN he gets partners on the ground to provide video evidence of their deliveries.
Akil agreed that politics were playing a role in aid distribution.
“A lot of people use aid to get political loyalties. We have heard stories that some groups send aid only to people who are backing their ideologies.”
Denial
Læs videre på
http://www.irinnews.org/Report/96760/Analysis-Aid-to-Syria-winning-friends-and-influence
