The Norwegian Refugee Council calls for the lifting of the economic blockade of Syria, Iran and Venezuela

Geneva-Sana

The Norwegian Refugee Council called on the United States and the European Union today to immediately lift the economic blockade imposed on the peoples of Syria, Iran and Venezuela, which is hampering its efforts to combat the Corona virus.

"What we are asking is the lifting of economic sanctions already on people and entire countries," Reuters quoted Jan England of the Norwegian Refugee Council as saying in an online news conference from Geneva, noting that Western sanctions imposed on the Syrian people prevented the council "from obtaining programs to educate children via the Internet And that "the procedures for humanitarian exemptions were very slow and bureaucratic."

He stressed that these sanctions "make it difficult for the Council and the rest of the relief organizations to work to serve ordinary people at a time when the Corona virus is spreading at a time when they face all these obstacles in their endeavor to help those who are most vulnerable during the health crisis in which they are raging."

The Syrian and Russian coordination bodies affirmed on the 15th of this month that the US sanctions imposed on the Syrian people aim to "annihilate the people of an entire country" and renewed the call on the international community to exert pressure on Washington to lift these unjust sanctions in light of the spread of the Corona virus in the world.

A joint statement by the two bodies urged the entire international community to give the Syrian government international support and pressure the United States and its European allies to lift illegal and inhumane sanctions that are in fact aimed at "genocide the population of an entire country."