Putin urges more active role of global community in humanitarian assistance to Syria

SOCHI, February 14./TASS/. The United Nations and the global community should play a more active role in rendering humanitarian assistance to the Syrian people without politicizing the issue and setting preconditions, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the Russia-Turkey-Iran summit on the Syrian settlement in Sochi. He said about a million Syrian people still need access to humanitarian aid. "We expect that the entire global community, especially the UN and its relevant agencies will play a more active role in rendering assistance to all Syrians - without politicization and without preconditions," Putin said. Issues of humanitarian assistance to Syria invite most serious attention, Putin stressed. "Russia, Iran and Turkey are investing joint efforts in order to get the country back to a normal life, to help the Syrians in the post-conflict development of their country," Putin added. "Concrete results can already be seen - alone in the past six months, more than 130,000 Syrian refugees have been able to return home safely," the Russian leader stressed. He said conditions have been created for a safe and unhindered access of humanitarian aid to the regions affected by the conflict, as a result of which "the number of Syrians deprived of a possibility to get such aid, has been reduced by three times". Read more