The residents of the besieged Damascus suburb of Darayya have welcomed the first deliveries of food aid to reach the city since 2012.
The latest delivery to Darayya was made by teams from the Syrian Red Crescent and the United Nations’ humanitarian body.
The UN’s special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, said on Thursday that the Syrian government had given permission for aid to be delivered to 19 besieged areas, where an estimated 600,000 people live.
Trucks carrying medicine, food and flour entered the town that was among the first to report protests against President Bashar Al-assad’s Government.
The operations director of the Syrian Red Crescent, Tamam Mehrez, also told AFP that the goods would be enough for residents for one month.
An official with the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) said that he had met some beneficiaries of the food aid and community leaders.
“The supply of the very basic commodities is very challenging, so as a consequence the prices of the commodities themselves are very high whenever they are available,” he said.
The delivery of food supplies came a week after a joint convoy of the UN, the International Committee of the Red Cross and SARC reached Daraya and delivered medicine, vaccines, baby formula, and “nutritional items for children” but no food.
However, violence was reported on Friday in the rebel-held area as crude barrel bombs have been dropped on the suburb, according to the Local Council of Daraya.
This came just hours after the food aid was delivered to its residents
Daraya has been under siege since November 2012 and has witnessed some of the worst bombardment during Syria’s civil war, now in its sixth year.
