---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: UNNews <UNNews@un.org>
Date: 4 Jun 2013 14:00:01 -0400
Subject: EXPLOSIONS AND SECURITY CHECKS: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF AN UNRWA
STAFFER IN SYRIA
To: news11@ny-mail-p-lb-028.ptc.un.org
EXPLOSIONS AND SECURITY CHECKS: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF AN UNRWA STAFFER
IN SYRIANew York, Jun 4 2013 2:00PMMany United Nations staff members
are deployed in duty stations deemed difficult or hazardous, but the
current situation in violence-torn Syria presents the furthest
extreme in work conditions – all-out open combat.
For staff of the UN Relief and Works Agency for the Palestine
Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) that has been the reality in the
over two years since the uprising against the Government of Bashar
al-Assad began.
Asked to describe her work day, an UNRWA official based in the
Palestinian refugee camp in Homs told the UN News Centre that she and
her co-workers maintain their service to refugees amid the constant
sound of artillery blasts, some distant, some nearer.
It was most harrowing when the adjoining neighbourhood of Baba Amr
was the scene of fierce fighting. "When they were fighting in Baba Amr
whole shells were coming over our heads, and we were counting down to
hear the explosions. Our building was really shaking and our
windows would open," she said.
After that experience and two years of conflict, low-flying aircraft
were still terrifying, she says, but she has gotten accustomed to the
daily barrage. "For mortar and tank shelling, everybody is used to
this," she said.
She works, she said, a minimum of 12 hours a day now, because of
extra time needed to visit facilities she monitors, the increased
workload due to incoming and outgoing displaced persons and the fact
that she herself is displaced inside the refugee camp, with little
else to do.
Early on in the fighting she had fled from her home in another
neighbourhood to take up residence near the UNRWA offices, which are
in tucked in the centre of the half- mile square refugee camp, which
has not been a focus of fighting.
Despite the relative calm within the camp, security rules the day.
Every evening and every morning, the office reviews the situation to
determine which installations are possible to visit. Staff
travelling from locations outside the camp are often advised to stay
at home.
Those who are expected in the morning and do not appear are called
find out their situation, "whether they left, they're kidnapped, they
disappeared, detained you know… we are facing such cases on a daily
basis," she said.
After checking on the safety of all staff, the office starts
receiving refugees and trying to meet their needs, including emergency
aid in the form of cash assistance and food packages. A newly-set
up section registers IDPs coming from other areas because of the
crisis.
The office has no municipal electricity. For that reason, paperwork,
communications, data input and anything else done by computer has to
been done during a two-hour period in the morning during which staff
has agreed was the best time to turn on the generator, which has a
limited supply of fuel.
For lunch, the staff members are able to get fruit and vegetables
from Latakia and other areas that have not yet been badly affected by
the fighting, although inflation is rampant. "What you were
previously were paying 100 Syrian pounds now it costs 800 Syrian
pounds. The meat is very expensive," the official said.
Afternoons are reserved for visits to other UNRWA facilities. "We
used to travel to Hama in 45 minutes from Homs. Now we need five
hours," she said, listing neighbourhoods that must be avoided. When
she cannot travel, she checks on the situation of students in nearby
UNRWA schools.
Despite all precautions, staff remain extremely vulnerable. A clerk
was kidnapped with his car several weeks ago on his way home from
work and demands for ransom have changed to offers of a swap. "Up to
now he is still kidnapped and we don't know where he is," the UNRWA
officer said.
A week before that, a staff driver was taken with a vehicle full of
medicines that he was bringing to the Hama camp. They have not been
able to make contact with him either, she said.Jun 4 2013 2:00PM
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