Syrian Embassy Requests Indians to Contribute, Donate Medicines, Winter Clothes for Earthquake Victims

The Syrian Embassy on Thursday requested Indians to donate essential items and contribute to the victims of the catastrophic 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Monday, killing more than 19,300 people.

While rescuers continued their race to pull more people alive from thousands of collapsed structures, the window to find trapped survivors continued to close amid freezing temperatures.

“The Syrian government mobilized all its forces to meet the challenges and reach to the affected victims, providing them with shelter and essential supplies,” the Syrian mission in New Delhi stated in a release.

Urging people from India to volunteer, it listed several essential requirements, including medicines and winter clothes to be donated and sent to the Embassy of the Syrian Arab Republic in Vasant Vihar, New Delhi.

“We need urgently: Medical equipment and devices, emergency medicines, blankets, tents, winter clothes, protection and safety tools and many other items to help people,” it read.

It further listed the Embassy of Syria in India Facebook page and details of its bank account number for queries related to the donations and contributions.

The Syrian Embassy highly appreciates your support and kindness in these difficult times, it added.

Meanwhile, the first United Nations aid trucks to enter rebel-held northwest Syria from Turkiye arrived Thursday morning, according to an Associated Press report. While smaller aid organisations have sent in shipments, only the UN is authorised to deliver aid through one border crossing, which has also been damaged following the quake. Syria, which suffers from severe poverty following a decade of civil war, is reelings under Western sanctions linked to the war.

The report stated that the ongoing war and the isolation of the rebel-held region along the border, surrounded by Russia-backed government forces, has also hampered the aid efforts.

India’s “Operation Dost” to Help Turkey-Syria Earthquake Rescue Efforts

India launched “Operation Dost” to extend assistance to Turkey and Syria following Monday’s devastating quake.

The NDRF is working to extricate live victims from under the rubble and providing first-aid to the injured, before handing them over to medical response authorities. India has sent more than 250 personnel, specialised equipment and other relief material amounting to more than 135 tonnes to Turkey on six C-17 IAF aircraft.

The Indian Army has also set up a 30 bedded Field Hospital at Iskenderun in Hatay province in Türkiye to help victims.

To Syria, New Delhi has dispatched 6 tons of emergency relief assistance through a special aircraft of the Indian Air Force to Damascus. The consignment contains emergency medicines and equipment including portable ECG machines, patient monitors and other essential medical items.

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