UN - The UN security council failed to agree after a second day of intensive talks on a proposed 30-day ceasefire across Syria to allow for emergency humanitarian deliveries and medical evacuations.
Backroom negotiations continued throughout the day on Friday. One deadline passed after another, as other council members tried to persuade Russia to agree to a resolution. The talks at the UN headquarters in New York followed an appeal by French and German leaders to Vladimir Putin, asking for Russia to stop blocking the measure’s passage, pointing to the dire situation of the trapped civilian population in the rebel enclave of eastern Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus.
The draft resolution calls for a nationwide truce to come into force within 72 hours of its adoption, but it is not clear how forces in Syria would respond even if it was passed.
Eastern Ghouta has come under particularly intense regime bombardment in recent days as the government of Bashar al-Assad seeks to crush the resistance in the district, home to an estimated 400,000 people. Reports from the area said that more than 400 civilians had been killed there this week, and that hospitals and clinics had been directed targeted. (The Guardian)