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Displacements From Syria's Idlib Hit Record Levels

Margaret Besheer

   UNITED NATIONS - The United Nations said Friday that more than 140,000
   civilians have been displaced from northwestern Syria in just the last
   three days.

   An escalation in fighting across Idlib and Aleppo has pushed more than
   830,000 people to flee their homes since early December, causing what
   the U.N. has said is the biggest humanitarian catastrophe since the
   conflict started in 2011. Some 3 million people live in the province.

   "Women and children are among those that are suffering the most -- they
   make up about 81% of the recently displaced people," U.N. spokesman
   Stephane Dujarric told reporters. "Temperatures across northwest Syria
   have been below freezing for several days, leaving families exposed to
   increasingly harsh conditions."

   Many of the displaced are moving north toward already overcrowded camps
   near the Syria-Turkey border.

   They are fleeing an escalation in fighting between the Syrian military,
   which is backed by Russia and Iran, and Syrian armed opposition groups,
   some of whom have Turkish support. The Syrian government is trying to
   crush the last major opposition strongholds.

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