Titled “Withheld, retained, misappropriated: Humanitarian aid in Syria” on the 11 January the panel included: Natasha Hall, Senior Fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) - Ibrahim Olabi, lawyer at Guernica 37; founder of the Syrian Legal Development Program - Dr Carsten Wieland, Advisor to the Greens parliamentary group on the Middle East - Susanne Fries-Gaier, German MFA, Representative for Humanitarian Aid.
The full panel can be found here
In an Article titled The Weaponization of Humanitarian Aid, the authors noted that “More recently, the American Relief Coalition for Syria, a group of Syrian diaspora–led humanitarian organizations, and international lawyers at Guernica 37, a British law practice that focuses on international criminal and human rights law, argued that although action by the Security Council gave a clearer basis for cross-border aid with Resolution 2165, the situation on the ground today makes the resolution only one of several legal justifications for such aid to continue. In short, the regime’s arbitrary denial of aid throughout the conflict and the static lines of control in the country support the argument that cross-border humanitarian assistance is legal.”
The full article can be read here
In an Article titled: “Is UN aid into Syria being used as a political football?”, light has been shed on the efforts of the Cross Border Aid into Syria is Legal team. Under the subheading “Growing need for alternatives”, the articles noted that “there is another possibility too, one that revolves around an initiative instigated by the American Relief Coalition for Syria, or ARCS, a US-based umbrella for Syrian aid organizations, and British human rights lawyers, Guernica 37, also known as G37.” Going further it highlighted that
“The G37's legal initiative is planning to publish a similar letter again shortly, this time with signatories including former judges at the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice.
It further quoted:
"Changing the status-quo taken for granted by many for the past eight years is not straightforward," Ibrahim Olabi, a lawyer at G37 and a key strategist behind the initiative, told DW.” He and the initiative's legal expert, Jack Sproson, have been working behind the scenes for over six months to convince supportive governments to back the idea that cross-border aid for Syria is legal without UNSC permission. They have been meeting delegations in Berlin, Paris, Brussels, Washington, New York, London, Bern and Ankara, among others. "The question now is how governments will be able to move on this issue," he said. "But I think realistic prospects exist. There's huge interest and some politicians have told us that the political cost of renewing [the resolution regularly] has simply become much too high," he concluded.
The full article can be read here