Red Cross provides aid to Baba Amr civilians

The Swiss-run International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delivered aid on Sunday to areas around the battered Baba Amr district of the Syrian city of Homs.

But it said it had been prevented from entering Baba Amr by Syrian ground forces despite receiving government permission, a move activists said was to prevent aid workers witnessing army “massacres”.

“We have started to distribute humanitarian aid in Abel village, three kilometres from Baba Amr,” ICRC spokesman Saleh Dabbakeh told AFP.

“Many refugees from Baba Amr are in Abel,” he said, adding they were being supplied with food products and blankets.

Dabbakeh said a similar operation would take place in Inshaat, another district of Homs, while the ICRC and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent Society awaited the go-ahead from Syrian authorities to enter Baba Amr.

“We have the green light, we hope to enter, we hope today is the day,” said Dabbakeh.

A seven-truck convoy organised by the aid groups has been waiting since Friday to enter Baba Amr, with the authorities saying they were being barred for their own safety because of the presence of bombs and landmines.

Rebel fighters fled the neighbourhood on Thursday in the face of a ground assault by regime forces following a month-long shelling siege.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Friday he had received “grisly reports” troops were executing and torturing people in Homs after insurgents abandoned their positions.

The UN says more than 7,500 people have been killed in the Syrian uprising.