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STORY: UN / SYRIA POLITICAL HUMANITARIAN
TRT: 04:17
SOURCE: UNIFEED
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGES: ENGLISH / ARABIC / NATS
DATELINE: 25 MARCH 2025, NEW YORK CITY / FILE
FILE – NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, United Nations headquarters
25 MARCH 2025, NEW YORK CITY
2. Wide shot, Security Council
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Geir Pedersen, Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Syria:
“The legacies of 14 years of war and conflict and five decades of one-man rule are huge. So are the immediate challenges facing the Syrians today.”
4. Wide shot, Security Council
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Geir Pedersen, Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Syria:
“On Thursday March 6, armed groups associated with the former regime attacked and ambushed caretaker authority forces across the coastal region. Reports indicate attacks on military and internal security targets, and also several hospitals. The scale and sophistication of the attacks were striking, with many claimed by groups of former regime officers.”
6. Wide shot, Security Council
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Geir Pedersen, Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Syria:
“But far more disturbing was the appalling civilian death toll, including widespread summary killings of civilians and unarmed individuals, including accounts of entire families executed at point blank, and widespread footage of grave violations of a plainly sectarian and retaliatory nature – singling out Allawites.”
8. Wide shot, Security Council
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator:
“We are under no illusions about the grim financial outlook for humanitarian support globally. In a bracing funding context, we will deploy the resources we have as effectively as possible. We have completed a country-wide Rapid Needs Assessment, and are monitoring displacement and population movements, to sharpen our response. We are also making brutal choices, including to focus our current appeal on the most vulnerable – about half the total people in need. Last year’s appeal was only 35 per cent funded – causing us to reduce our humanitarian response by more than half.”
10. Wide shot, Security Council
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator:
“Let us be problem solvers rather than problem observers. We need to move with greater urgency, while we can. The price of failure will far outweigh the investment we are asking for.”
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Joumana Seif, Co-founder of the Syrian Women's Political Movement and Legal Advisor at the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights:
“Today, more than ever, Syrians must create a transparent and inclusive national plan for transitional justice. This requires consultation with victims Association and civil society to ensure fair trials, truth commissions, moral and financial compensation for victims and safeguards to prevent future atrocities.”
13. Wide shot, Security Council
14. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Qusay Abdul Jabbar al-Dahha, Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Syrian Arab Republic:
“Syria is moving forward at this pivotal stage in its history, following the national dialog conference, and based on its outcome, and with the aim of preparing the legal framework for the transitional phase, the Presidency of the Republic formed a committee to draft the Constitutional Declaration, which was subsequently approved.”
15. Wide shot, Security Council
16. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Qusay Abdul Jabbar al-Dahha, Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Syrian Arab Republic:
“The Syrian leadership affirmed that the new Syria will be a state of law, and that the law will apply to all it emphasized that any attack on the sanctity blood property of people is a red line, and that the blood of the innocent will not go unpunished, regardless of the identity of the perpetrators.”
17. Wide shot, end of the Security Council meeting
“The legacies of 14 years of war and conflict and five decades of one-man rule are huge. So are the immediate challenges facing the Syrians today,” said UN Special Envoy Geir Pedersen.
Briefing the Security Council today (Mar 25) on Syria’s political and humanitarian landscape, Pedersen described a resurgence of violence in early March that he said bears the hallmarks of renewed internal conflict.
“On Thursday March 6, armed groups associated with the former regime attacked and ambushed caretaker authority forces across the coastal region,” Pedersen said. “Reports indicate attacks on military and internal security targets, and also several hospitals.”
He noted the “scale and sophistication” of the attacks were “striking,” many carried out by groups linked to former regime officers. But what followed was worse, he said, pointing to mass killings of civilians.
“Far more disturbing was the appalling civilian death toll, including widespread summary killings of civilians and unarmed individuals,” he told the Council. “Accounts of entire families executed at point blank, and widespread footage of grave violations of a plainly sectarian and retaliatory nature – singling out Allawites.”
On the humanitarian front, UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher warned that critical funding gaps are forcing aid agencies to make “brutal choices.”
“Last year’s appeal was only 35 per cent funded – causing us to reduce our humanitarian response by more than half,” he said. “We are under no illusions about the grim financial outlook.”
Fletcher said the UN had completed a country-wide rapid needs assessment and was now focusing aid on the most vulnerable — roughly half of the 16.7 million people in need.
“Let us be problem solvers rather than problem observers,” he urged. “The price of failure will far outweigh the investment we are asking for.”
Joumana Seif, co-founder of the Syrian Women’s Political Movement, echoed calls for long-term accountability alongside immediate aid, urging Syrians to lead the process.
“Today, more than ever, Syrians must create a transparent and inclusive national plan for transitional justice,” she said, emphasizing the role of civil society and victim associations in ensuring justice and preventing future atrocities.
Representing the Syrian government, Ambassador Qusay Abdul Jabbar al-Dahha told the Council that the country is moving forward with constitutional reform following the national dialogue conference.
“With the aim of preparing the legal framework for the transitional phase, the Presidency of the Republic formed a committee to draft the Constitutional Declaration, which was subsequently approved,” he said.
He stressed that the “new Syria will be a state of law,” vowing that attacks on civilians “will not go unpunished, regardless of the identity of the perpetrators.”
