UN says blocking aid to Syria may amount to war crime

PanARMENIAN.Net - The UN's top human rights official says the repeated obstruction of convoys trying to resupply the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Syria may amount to a war crime, the Associated Press reports.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay says numerous attempts by the UN and other organizations over the past four months to deliver aid to the 18,000 people in the camp have been thwarted.

Pillay said in a statement Friday, Jan 17, that badly needed food and medical aid is not reaching malnourished children, women and elderly people close to starvation because of "a quagmire between besieging Syrian government forces and affiliated militias surrounding the Yarmouk camp, as well as anti-government armed groups operating inside."

Pillay says there have been reports of a number of deaths from starvation and from consuming rotten food.