The UN Syria cross-border aid mandate is dead. What comes next could be a catastrophe

Syria’s Ambassador to the U.N. Bassam Sabbagh announced on July 13 that a “decision” had been made to “grant” the U.N. “permission” to provide humanitarian aid to northwestern Syria via the Bab al-Hawa crossing “for a period of six months,” on the condition that aid delivery is undertaken “in full cooperation and coordination with the Syrian government.” Sabbagh added further that “aid distribution” would need to be coordinated by the Red Cross and Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC), bodies whose Syria operations are headquartered in Damascus, and whose capacity to operate is strictly controlled by the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

The declaration by Assad’s regime came two days after voting at the U.N. Security Council failed to extend a U.N. mandate that had secured cross-border aid deliveries to northwestern Syria for nine consecutive years. A Russian veto was what killed that tried and tested mechanism, and as things stand, the nearly decade-old U.N. mandate is now dead and the Assad regime’s offer is the de facto reality, according to two U.N. Security Council members who spoke to me on the condition of anonymity. They say informal consultations are already underway between the U.N. and the Syria aid mission’s core donor countries — principally the U.S., the U.K., France, Germany, the Netherlands, and other European governments — as to what to do next. Plans are afoot to draft a U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at enforcing a strict program of monitoring and reporting, to at least attempt to deter the regime from impeding aid delivery. But Russia is likely to block that too.

The prospect of the Assad regime being able to exert all control over what aid goes into Syria’s northwest is unconscionable. This is a regime that has spent the past 12 years methodically and systematically impeding, diverting, stealing, and weaponizing aid delivery as an intrinsic part of its well-documented siege and starve strategy to suppress its opponents. Whether by inserting crushed glass or bird feces into shipments of rice and flour, removing baby formula and medicines, or simply refusing aid access altogether, the regime’s track record is clear and damning. According to one European diplomat in New York, Assad’s regime “has a history of instrumentalizing humanitarian assistance, so we’re very concerned about the conditionality it is attaching to the authorization. […] At the very least, there will need to be a robust monitoring.”

The regime’s demand for SARC to distribute aid poses a particular challenge. SARC’s President Khaled Hboubati, who was hand-picked by Assad for the role, is a former nightclub and casino owner with deep family ties to the Assad clan. According to several opposition sources from Damascus and Daraa, Hboubati played a central and regime-permitted role in financially benefitting from sieges in the years prior to his SARC appointment. In the early phases of armed conflict in Syria, senior SARC personnel were detained and some disappeared merely for providing aid to opposition areas. Proposing that SARC manage aid distribution in northwestern Syria is a non-starter: Among the civilians living there, it is viewed widely as a potentially hostile actor little different from the regime itself.

The humanitarian crisis in the northwest

Northwestern Syria represents a small corner of Syrian territory — roughly 3% of the country — yet it is home to 4.5 million people, or at least 20% of the in-country population. This strategically vital pocket of land is home to those Syrians who have done everything to avoid living under the regime. Sixty-four percent of the 4.5 million are displaced, most having been forced from their homes several times since 2011. Ninety percent are wholly reliant on aid; 75% are food insecure; 42% live in camps; and 50% display symptoms of severe mental health crises. And just months ago, they were struck by the worst earthquake to hit the region in 200 years — after which, they received no aid or assistance whatsoever for a week.

Northwestern Syria is home to the world’s most acute humanitarian crisis. The prospect of a dramatic reduction in aid supply doesn’t bear thinking about. The last time the area witnessed a bout of major hostilities, over a million civilians were displaced in three weeks — a virtually unprecedented rate of displacement.

According to the Assad regime and its Russian and Iranian allies, the U.N.’s long-standing cross-border aid delivery mechanism represented a violation of Syrian sovereignty. Yet as the world’s leading international jurists have made clear, there is an irrefutable legal basis for the provision of aid to those in need, without any government consent. Moreover, the Assad regime hasn’t controlled any territory within 50 km of Bab al-Hawa since early 2012.

After the February earthquake, the regime refused to grant the U.N.’s request for aid access to northwestern Syria for a week, thereby closing out the so-called “golden window” during which it remains theoretically possible to rescue people alive under the rubble. When the regime later decided to “grant” permission for earthquake aid, Sabbagh was asked by a journalist why it had taken so long to do so. He burst into laughter and quipped: “Why are you asking me? We don’t control these borders.” That statement, intended at the time to ridicule the U.N. for seeking regime permission, is particularly haunting today.

Severing access and exploiting aid

With Russia’s support and seat on the U.N. Security Council, the regime has methodically severed cross-border aid access into areas of Syria outside its control since early 2020. The channel via Bab al-Hawa was all that was left — until this week. The regime’s counterpoint was that cross-line delivery — aid supplies beginning in and coordinated from Damascus — should become the new and only mechanism. Yet despite the regime’s clear desire to prioritize cross-line aid, it has given permission for only 152 trucks to supply northwestern Syria since July 2021. The cross-border mechanism, meanwhile, has supplied approximately 24,000 trucks of aid to the northwest over the same timeframe. There is simply no comparison. If the regime is obdurate about following through with its new cross-border offer, then Syria’s northwest is on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.

Assuming the regime’s offer is accepted in some form, it contains or implies a range of deeply problematic issues that will render it virtually unworkable. Beyond the proposed role of the Red Cross and SARC themselves, it is unclear what role could be played by the huge network of U.N. staff and local Syrian implementers that have run the U.N. mechanism since 2014. Few Syrians will agree to work with a regime-coordinated effort, for obvious security reasons. But if the Red Cross and SARC are to take on aid delivery, the regime will have plentiful opportunities to use “risk assessments” as a means for considerable delay, crippling delivery. The regime also demands the U.N. cease any and all communication with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the entity in de facto control of the northwest. Nowhere in the world does aid delivery take place in conflict zones or contested territory without coordination with de facto authorities. The U.N. has a years-long record of coordinating with HTS and its “Salvation Government,” frequently visiting in-person and even initiating plans to establish a permanent U.N. office in Idlib.

Donor countries should in no way resign themselves to this new arrangement. If they do, they will be funding a mechanism that is explicitly and clearly designed to allow the regime to drip feed and sever at will aid access to the 4.5 million most vulnerable people in Syria — those who fear the regime the most. The international community has feared this moment might come for three years and has deliberated on alternative aid delivery plans at length. The question is, will they be bold enough to consider a Plan B, or are we about to watch the foundational pillars for humanitarian action — humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence — dragged through the mud and thrown in our collective faces?

Charles Lister is a senior fellow and the director of the Syria and Countering Terrorism & Extremism programs at the Middle East Institute.

Photo by Muhammed Said/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images