Syria needs more humanitarian aid as winter approaches: ICRC

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Thursday warned the humanitarian situation in Syria is deteriorating as winter approaches.

Nearly five years of conflict have left much of the country's infrastructure destroyed or severely damaged, and hundreds of thousands of people try to survive with the most basic resources as temperatures fall below freezing, the agency said.

According to ICRC, more than 12 million Syrians, nearly half of them are children, are now in need of immediate humanitarian assistance.

ICRC noted that more than 4 million Syrian people have fled abroad and around 8 million are displaced within the country. Many have been forced to move several times.

"Many of the refugees in neighboring countries such as Jordan and Lebanon live in terrible conditions and are struggling to find warmth as temperatures fall. They live with the uncertainty of not knowing what tomorrow will bring or even if they will ever make it back home one day," said Robert Mardini, ICRC's director for the Near and Middle East.

In Syria, the ICRC has started distributing winter clothes for 300,000 children between the ages of six months and nine years. Work has also been done to improve the living conditions of dozens of collective-shelters and other places where displaced people are being hosted.

Since the beginning of the year, ICRC said it has provided food to over 7 million people together with the Syrian Arab Red Crescent. Endit