Foreign ministers pledge increased aid to Syrian opposition

The Friends of Syria, an international grouping that meets regularly to address that country's civil conflict, agreed on Thursday to increase support to the Syrian opposition.

Meeting in London, the group poured scorn on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's plan to press ahead with presidential elections on 3 June, despite the raging civil war.

"We have agreed unanimously to take further steps together, through a coordinated strategy, to: increase our support for the moderate opposition National Coalition, its Supreme Military Council and associated moderate armed groups," said a communique agreed upon by 11 foreign ministers from Western and Arab countries - including US Secretary of State John Kerry and UK Foreign Minister William Hague.

Hague stated that the UK will be adding £30 mn ($50 mn) in “practical support” for the opposition and increasing funding in cross border aid. 

“We will strongly support a new UN security council resolution to compel the regime to allow humanitarian aid into Syria and to halt its starvation and surrender tactics,” he said after the meeting.

Three years into the war which has claimed 150,000 lives, Hague said the group was determined "to step up our efforts to deliver humanitarian aid across borders and across lines irrespective of the consent of the regime".

The United States, which has put up some $1.7 billion in humanitarian aid, also voiced frustration at the bottleneck in getting food and supplies to desperate civilians.

"It is not getting to people. It's going through one gate, one entryway, and it's going through Damascus and/or controlled by the Assad regime. That's unacceptable," said Kerry.

"We're going to join with other countries in an effort to try to guarantee accountability through the UN in making that happen."

The UN's director of aid operations in Syria, John Ging, last week accused the Syrian government of blockading medical supplies bound for opposition areas, calling it an "abomination".

With 3.5 million Syrians in areas that aid convoys are able to reach only sporadically, and with over 240,000 stuck in besieged communities, blockades have become a powerful tool by both sides.

National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (SMDK) Secretary-General Bedir Camus had asked, earlier on Thursday, the London 11 Friends of Syria to provide more financial and military aid to the opposition.

The London 11 have also agreed to "hold the Assad regime accountable for the terror it is perpetrating, including through a Security Council referral to the International criminal court” while denouncing "the Assad regime’s unilateral plan to hold illegitimate presidential elections on June 3". 

"I hope the countries that attend to the meeting of the core group of Friends of Syria in London today exhibit the same attitude about the presidential election in Syria," Camus told Turkey's Anadolu Agency, recalling France and Germany’s decision to prevent voting, in their respective countries, for Syria's presidential election.

Camus also asked the Friends of Syria to promote the Syrian opposition’s diplomatic representation level as the United States had done last week. On 5 May, the US granted the Syrian Opposition Coalition’s offices in Washington and New York foreign mission status.