Red Cross steps up aid to Syria under local truces: senior official

By Stephanie Nebehay GENEVA (Reuters) - Syrian authorities and insurgents have allowed the Red Cross to deliver growing amounts of aid under local ceasefires since August, in a possible harbinger of reconciliation in the civil war, an ICRC official said on Thursday. Boris Michel, outgoing head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delegation in Syria, also told Reuters in an interview it had made five visits to four government-run prisons last year, the first since May 2012. "If you want to de-escalate the conflict, you have to start from the local level and build local truces, arrangements, just to stabilize the situation because people are exhausted after four years of conflict and the human cost of it is huge." The ICRC has 300 staff in Syria, including 51 expatriates against 35 a year ago. We convinced authorities to provide more access to victims so there is more delivery of humanitarian assistance on a needs-based approach, therefore crossing lines across Syria," he said.



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