WHO chief visits rebel-held Syria for first time after quake

BAB ALHAWA, SYRIA     -    World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghe­breyesus on Wednesday urged the international community to help earthquake-hit northwest Syria, on his first ever visit to rebel-held areas of the war-rav­aged country. “The people of northwest Syria need the as­sistance of the international community to recover and re­build,” Tedros told reporters af­ter entering from neighbour­ing Turkey via the Bab al-Hawa border crossing. “I call on the international community, gov­ernments, philanthropists, in­dividuals, to dig deep,” add­ed Tedros, the highest-ranking United Nations official to visit the rebel-held area since civil war broke out almost 12 years ago. The WHO chief had already travelled to government-con­trolled Aleppo and Damascus the same week as the February 6 disaster that killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey and Syria. Tedros on Wednesday visited several hospitals and a shelter near the Turkish bor­der for people displaced by the disaster, an AFP correspondent said. Turkish-backed officials in Syria have put the death toll in rebel-held areas at 4,537, while the Syrian government has said 1,414 people were killed in ar­eas under its control. The UN has launched a $397 million appeal to help quake victims in Syria, but Tedros warned that “we are not getting as much as what is needed for this emer­gency”.

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