UN Security Council renews authorization of cross-border humanitarian access to Syria

UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) -- The Security Council on Tuesday adopted a resolution to renew authorization of cross-border and cross-line humanitarian access to Syria for a further period of 12 months till Jan. 10, 2019.

Resolution 2393 was adopted with 12 votes in favor with three abstentions by Bolivia, China and Russia.

It requests the Syrian authorities to expeditiously respond to all requests for cross-line deliveries submitted by the United Nations and their implementing partners and to give such requests positive consideration.

The resolution, which was drafted by Egypt, Japan and Sweden, reiterates that the situation in Syria will continue to deteriorate in the absence of a political solution and calls for efforts to facilitate a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition.

The resolution requests UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to conduct, within six months of the adoption of the resolution, an independent written review of the UN humanitarian cross-border operations, including recommendations on how to further strengthen the UN monitoring mechanism.

Cross-border and cross-line humanitarian access to Syria was approved by the Security Council in 2014. Enditem