The Biden administration made it clear yesterday that there’ll be no lifting of U.S. sanctions on Syria to allow economic reconstruction. “The United States will not provide any reconstruction assistance, absent progress on the political track,” said Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration Richard Albright. Albright said that no military solution would bring peace, security and stability to Syria and the region.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin warned, in contrast, that if calls for recovery projects in Syria continue to be rejected “in favor of politicized positions to reject humanitarian recovery, discrimination of government territories and suffocation with sanctions backed by demands for political transformations in Syria.”
“In this light we urge everyone to think what a social and economic collapse in Syria will result in? What irreversible consequences it is fraught with? Another black hole can emerge in the Middle East similar to those of Yemen and Libya, while the West, primarily European countries, will be hit by another large-scale refugee wave,” he observed.
Both Albright and Vershinin were speaking in the context of a donors’ conference to raise funds for humanitarian efforts in Syria hosted by the European Union in Brussels. The Associated Press reported this morning that the U.S., the EU and dozens of other countries pledged a total of $6.4 billion for efforts in Syria and to countries hosting 6 million Syrian refugees. This may sound like a substantial fund but it’s less than the $7.7 billion pledged last year.
A group of 37 aid agencies said they were disappointed. “While we welcome countries’ pledges that have kept their funding at similar levels to last year’s or increased it, as did Germany, it is extremely disappointing to see two major donors, the U.K. and the U.S., turn their back on the plight of Syrians,” they said. “This will have a devastating impact on their lives.”
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield announced more than $596 million in U.S. humanitarian assistance for 2021. The U.S. pledge for 2020 is not reported but the U.K. pledge of £205 million in aid compares to £300 million last year and £400 million in 2019.
