Al-Rukban camp | Dire living conditions force more families to head to regime-held areas
Two families have left Al-Rukban camp in the 55-kilometre zone at Syria-Jordan-Iraq border triangle for regime-held Homs province, fleeing the disastrous humanitarian and dire living conditions of the residents in Al-Rukban camp due to the high prices and the siege of the camp by the regime forces and Iranian-backed militia.
SOHR activists reported seeing the departure of two families from Al-Rukban camp today, September 18 toward regime-controlled Homs province with no security guarantees to protect them from regime oppression.
The two families are from Muhin town in southern Homs countryside and Al-Qariyatayn in eastern Homs countryside.
It is worth noting that the cases of inhabitants leaving Al-Rukban camp escalated recently over the dreadful living conditions in the camp in light of the suspension of assistance provided by humanitarian organisations. In addition, the prices of basic products have reached levels unaffordable by many because of levies imposed by regime checkpoints on trucks transporting food to the camp, as well as the lack of job opportunities. All these factors have turned the camp, which hosts nearly 8,500 displaced Syrian people from various provinces, into a “large prison” in the Syrian desert.
Accordingly, the number of families which have left Al-Rukban camp since early August has reached 38; they left in 13 batches as follows:
• August 1: Three families: two of Al-Fawa’erah tribe and one from Deir Ezzor, left for Homs city.
• August 3: Four families of Bani Khalid tribe left for Homs city.
• August 10: Two families from Palmyra city left for Homs city.
• August 13: Two families of Al-Ammour left for Homs city.
• August 13: Three families: a family from Mahin city, a family from Al-Qaryatayn and a family of Bani Khalid tribe, left for Homs city.
• August 17: Three families of Al-Na’eem tribe left for Homs city.
• August 21: A family left for Palmyra city.
• August 30: Two families left for Mahin city and Aleppo countryside.
• September 2: Two families, several young men and three women left for Homs city.
• September 4: Four families left for Homs city and countryside.
• September 9: Six families left for Homs city.
• September 11: Four families and three young men left for Homs city.
• September 18: Two families left for Homs city.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) stresses the right of Syrian civilians in Al-Rukban camp to obtain food, drinking water and health and medical care, and calls for intensifying efforts to put an end to the sufferings of the camp’s inhabitants.
SOHR also calls upon all relevant organisations to allow sick people and emergency cases in the camp inhabitant to receive treatment in Jordanian hospitals and/or to open a hospital with specialised doctors inside the camp.