UN launches 'largest ever' aid convoy for Rukban camp in Syria: spokesman
Xinhua
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This photo released by the Syrian Red Crescent, show trucks convoy of the Syrian Red Crescent which carry humanitarian aid to be distributed in Douma, eastern Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus, Syria, Friday March 9, 2018. (Photo: AP)

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 6 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent launched on Wednesday a massive aid operation for the more than 40,000 displaced people in Rukban Camp on the border with Jordan, a UN spokesman said.

Stephen Dujarric, the spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said the operation, which is expected to last about a week, is "the largest ever convoy to provide humanitarian assistance" to the remote, makeshift settlement in southeastern Syria.

"The joint inter-agency convoy consists of 118 trucks... and will deliver food, health, nutritional supplies, core relief items, water sanitation and hygiene materials, education items and children's recreational kits to people at the site, the vast majority of whom are vulnerable women and children," he said.

"Vaccines for some 10,000 children under five (years) of age will also be part of the convoy," Dujarric said.

"The UN and Red Crescent teams will be conducting close monitoring during and after distributions to ensure that humanitarian assistance reaches civilians in need," he said.

"The UN continues to urge all parties to allow safe, sustained and unimpeded humanitarian access to all people in need in Syria, in line with their obligations under international humanitarian law," he added.