Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps the Government is taking to tackle starvation and malnourishment in Syria.

The "Supporting Syria and the Region London 2016" Conference was held on 4 February last week, and more than US$11 billion was pledged to support people in Syria and the region affected by the conflict, the largest amount raised in one day for a humanitarian crisis. Commitments made at the Conference will help to create 1.1 million jobs and provide education to an additional 1 million children. The UK remains at the forefront of the response to the crisis in Syria and the region. We have doubled our commitment and have now pledged a total of over £2.3 billion, our largest ever response to a single humanitarian crisis. The outcomes of the conference are reflected in the Co-hosts' statement available on the Conference website www.supportingsyria2016.com.

Inside Syria we continue to support the United Nations’ World Food Programme, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, UNICEF and non-governmental organisations, to provide emergency food rations and nutrition interventions and to assist Syrians in growing their own food. Since the beginning of the crisis, UK support has, for instance, provided over 15 million food rations, access to clean water for over 1.6 million people and supported almost 500,000 people with agriculture and livelihoods interventions.

There are 486,700 people living in besieged areas and around 4.6 million in hard-to-reach areas in Syria. Across Syria, Assad and other parties to the conflict are wilfully impeding humanitarian access on a daily basis. It is outrageous, unacceptable and illegal to use starvation as a weapon of war.

On 11 January 2016, the UN, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent confirmed that aid convoys of humanitarian assistance had arrived in the besieged and hard-to-reach towns of Madaya, Foah and Kefraya. Further convoys have since arrived. DFID funding to UN agencies directly supported these convoys with food parcels, nutritional supplements, essential drugs and non-food items including winterisation kits. This is part of the UK’s ongoing support to the UN and international NGOs since the start of the conflict to deliver aid in hard to reach and besieged areas of Syria.

The most effective way to get food to people who are starving and stop these needless and horrific deaths is for Assad and all parties to the conflict to adhere to international humanitarian law. That is why the UK Government continues to call on the Assad regime and all parties to the conflict to allow immediate and unfettered access to all areas of Syria. On 4 February, the Supporting Syria and the Region Conference also brought leaders together to demand an end to these abuses and obstruction of humanitarian aid.