The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights

Al-Rukban camp in 2022 | Three children die of poor health conditions…nearly 1,000 risk their safety and lives by laving the camp…ongoing stifling siege by regime, Russians and Iranians

Most of the inhabitants of Al-Rukban camp, which is located near the Syria-Iraq-Jordan border triangle, live in very worn and used tents which do not protect them from hot weather in summers and freezing temperature in winters, while some managed to set huts to cope with the harsh weather. Stranded in a barren desert, Al-Rukban camp’s inhabitants are struggling with dreadful living conditions and disastrous situations to survive.

 

In a divided country, most of its people live in refugee camps and asylum countries, inhabitants of Al-Rukban camp have been suffering from hunger, extreme poverty, acute shortage of essentials and lack of services, while the strict siege imposed by Russian and regime forces and Iranian-backed militias has exacerbated the situation further. Accordingly, the camp’s inhabitants have only to options manifested in staying and attempting to survive in the camp and risking their lives and safety by leaving for regime-controlled areas without guarantees protecting them from arbitrary arrests. Already, several civilians, who had left the camp for regime-controlled areas, died under torture in regime prisons and security service.

 

Moreover, aid and humanitarian support, which had provided to the camp’s inhabitants whose number exceeding 8,000, has been suspended completely, as the powers besieging the camp continue preventing the entry of goods and essentials, at a time when International Coalition Forces stationed in Al-Tanaf base in the 55 kilometre de-confliction zone, which hosts the camp, have exerted no efforts to deliver support or put an end to the siege.

 

 

167 families left Al-Rukban camp in 2022

 

Attempting to flee from the catastrophic situation in the camp, nearly 167 families of nearly 1,000 people have left for regime-controlled areas. The monthly distribution of the number of families who left Al-Rukban camp in 2022, all documented by SOHR, is as follows:

 

  • January: 11 families from Al-Qaryatayn and Palmyra cities and Al-Na’im and Bani Khalid tribes.

 

  • February: Seven families from Palmyra city and Al-Na’im and Bani Khalid tribes, as well as seven young men who left individually.

 

  • March: Ten families from Palmyra city and Al-Na’im and Bani Izz tribes.

 

  • April: 24 families from Mahin, Palmyra and Al-Qaryatayn cities and Al-Na’im, Bani Khalid, Al-Sab’a and Al-Ammour tribes, as well as 19 young men who left individually.

 

  • May: 29 families from Sluk, Mahin and Palmyra cities and Al-Masharifah, Bani Khalid, Al-Turki and Al-Ammour tribes.

 

  • June: Nine families from Al-Qaryatayn, Mahin and Palmyra cities and Bani Khalid and Al-Ammour tribes.

 

  • July: 13 families from Aleppo, Mahin, Palmyra, Deir Ezzor and Al-Qaryatayn cities and Al-Jehayshat tribe, as well as two children and five young men who left individually.

 

  • August: 20 families from Al-Qaryatayn, Mahin, Deir Ezzor and Palmyra cities and Al-Fawa’erah, Bani Khalid and Al-Ammour tribes.

 

  • September: 26 families from Palmyra city and Bani Khalid and Al-Ammour tribes.

 

  • October: 15 families from different Syrian areas.

 

  • November: Three families.

 

  • December: No families or individuals left Al-Rukban camp in December.

 

 

Children: victims to disastrous situation

 

Since October 2018, regime forces and their allies have imposed a strict siege on Al-Rukban camp, with Russia’s content, preventing the access of goods and assistance, while the international community continues its “shameful” silence. Accordingly, the camp’s inhabitants, especially children, have been grappling with miserable situation at all levels.

 

The death of “Ashwaq” in late December is one evidence proving the tragic situation in the camp. The three-year-old girl suffered from meningitis, but her family felt helpless and could not save her with the lack of medics and acute shortage of medicines in the camp.

 

Another case was documented in October, when the baby girl “Yaqeen Issa” died of poor health conditions in the camp, as she was prevented from leaving for regime-held area to receive treatment.

 

Also, in August, a six-month-old boy from Palmyra city died of fever in light of the lack of medicine in the camp. Speaking to SOHR, the baby’s father who said that his son had fever and diarrhea, while his families failed to lower his body temperature using compresses only, in light of the lack of medicines in the camp. The father said that he could not take his son to hospitals or clinics outside the camp because of his dire living conditions, where a driver asked the father to give him 800 USD to drive his son out of the camp, but the father failed to secure the money.

 

Meanwhile, a mother lost her fetus in June due to her poor health conditions for the same reasons, the lack of medics and shortage of medicines. This incident is just one example, among many, of women concerned about losing their lives because of fever or hemorrhage or losing their fetuses because of malnutrition.

 

SOHR has been highlighting the plights of Al-Rukban camp’s inhabitants, where such tragic stories may provoke the international community to exert pressure on regime forces and their allies to lift the siege they have imposed on the camp.

 

On the other hand, most of the children in Al-Rukban camp are illiterate because of the dreadful living conditions, where many have dropped out of schools and turned to work to earn their living and help their families. Other children have turned to collect flammable objects which their families use for heating and cooking.

 

Inhabitants in the camp tried to build a school using mud blocks with the aim of enabling children to continue their education, but the school lacks heating system; let alone the leak of rainwater.

 

Despite all sufferings, the inhabitants are trying to help their children to learn alphabets, fearing creation of an illiterate generation. Ironically, providing humanitarian assistance and construction of schools in refugee camps are tasks of international organisations which have suspended their support almost completely. The crisis can be solved only when international resolutions are applied and construction starts in Syria, so that displaced people and refugees can return to their homes and enjoy a normal life.

 

 

Catastrophic situation

 

With the lack of essentials, including food, clothing, drinking water and medicines, especially with preventing the access of assistance provided by international organisations, the inhabitants have found themselves unable to secure their daily needs. The prevalence of viruses and diseases, such as cholera, fever and diarrhea, because of water contamination in light of the poor medical services and shortage of medicines, has exacerbated the situation further.

 

Medical assistance can be delivered to every place around the world, so the suspension of assistance in Al-Rukban camp is an evidence proving the fact that the international community has abandoned Syrians who have been forced to be displace.

 

 

Poverty and unemployment

 

The rate of unemployment in Al-Rukban camp have deepened the sufferings of displaced people who have been already struggling with the lack of livelihood in this barren desert. Even those who have chosen to leave the camp for work, may not return again, as they are exposed to be arbitrarily arrested, killed, forcibly disappeared and driven to battlefields.

 

Although the humanitarian situation in the camp has deteriorated to an unprecedented level, the international community seems indifferent to the disaster; which contravenes the international community’s stance and reaction to the Ukrainian cause and other tragic events around the world. The international community has adopted so far any effective efforts to put an end to the sufferings in the camp, which had hosted tens of thousands of displaced people before 2018. Recently, only 8,000 people have remained stranded in the camp, and they are unable to leave to improve their living conditions.

 

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) has been all along highlighting the pressure exerted on the camp’s inhabitants to force them to leave the camp for regime-controlled areas, noting that most of them are prosecuted security and militarily.

 

In light of the harsh conditions and the lack of healthy regimes and clean water, deadly diseases have alarmingly prevailed affecting children the most. Meanwhile, several organisations have warned against underestimating the situation in Al-Rukban camp and called for addressing the crisis immediately and helping the camp’s inhabitants to leave the camp with guarantees protecting them from humiliation and oppression by security authorities.

 

SOHR has also warned against preventing the access of humanitarian and medical assistance to the camp and hindering the efforts exerted by the organisations whose assistance has been suspended following political pressure exerted on them. It is worth noting that many food and medicine convoys have been seized by Shabiha who sold the assistance on black markets at high prices, which forced humanitarian organisations to suspend their support.

 

SOHR calls for keeping innocent civilians away from military and political actions and renews its appeals to transport children and patients from Al-Rukban camp to neighbouring countries for treatment.

 

We, at the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), stresse the right of Syrian civilians in Al-Rukban camp to obtain food, drinking water and health and medical care, and call for intensifying efforts to put an end to the sufferings of the camp’s inhabitants.

 

We also call for coordinated actions by all humanitarian and legal organisations not only to alleviate the suffering of the displaced people and overcrowding in the camp, but also to push influential international powers to find a lasting peaceful solution for Syria’s tragedy, a solution that enables the displaced and the deported Syrians to return to their homeland under national and international guarantees supervised by UN bodies.