Rukban Refugees Afraid To Come Back To Syria - Head Of Opposition Delegation At Astana-12

Internally displaced Syrians staying in the Rukban camp, located on the country's border with Jordan, are afraid of coming back to their places of permanent residence, Ahmad Tomah, the head of the Syrian opposition delegation at the 12th Astana-format talks on Syria, told reporters on Friday

NUR-SULTAN (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 26th April, 2019) - Internally displaced Syrians staying in the Rukban camp, located on the country's border with Jordan, are afraid of coming back to their places of permanent residence, Ahmad Tomah, the head of the Syrian opposition delegation at the 12th Astana-format talks on Syria, told reporters on Friday.

The Rukban camp, in which around 40,000 refugees are residing, lies in the US-controlled zone around its unauthorized military base in Syria's At-Tanf, making it hard for humanitarian workers to access.

"The Syrian government says that refugees in Rukban want to return home. It is actually wrong. They do not want to come home, they are afraid.

They know that these authorities are corrupt," Tomah said.

Moscow and Damascus have repeatedly tried to draw the attention of the international community to the deplorable conditions in which Rukban residents live and to the United States' reluctance to allow people to leave the camp.

The World Health Organization (WHO) described in January people residing in the camp as "trapped," adding that they lived in "deplorable" conditions. Limited water supply, bitterly cold weather and poorly functioning health-care facilities contribute to the rise of diseases, which include influenza, measles and tuberculosis, the WHO stated.