In Ramadan, Al waer neighborhood without basic staples

(Reporting by Ma’moon Abu Mohamed; Translation by Dani Murad)

In a war that grew out of pro-democracy protests in the summer of 2011, Forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad have used sieges as a war tactic to root out rebel forces from residential areas, increasing an already grave humanitarian crisis.

in this regard, activists have reported that Al-Waar neighborhood in Homs, the previously besieged city with nearly 400 thousand displaced, mostly from the old neighborhoods of Homs, has been witnessing a scarcity of salt, and they confirmed that the available stock of salt in people’s houses or shops had ran out, after regime’s intentional blockade to prevent this essential material under the pretext that it’s used in making explosive devices!

Abu Salah, one of the activists in Al-Waar says that finding salt has become so difficult like searching for a precious treasure, and he pointed out that regime forces at checkpoints, especially at “Al Mazraa” have been so strict in searching cars loaded with vegetables and food which enter the area from time to time, and they confiscated all the salt bags.

Moreover, the activist also pointed out that this strict monitoring to prevent the entry of salt into the neighborhood began more than four months ago, and led to the depletion of all salt’s amounts in people’s houses!

The neighborhood of Al-Waar, located nearly 5 kilometers from the center of Homs, and one of the largest neighborhoods of the city, is divided into two parts, the old district that includes: neighborhoods of Mimas and Almersi and Al-Qudat, while the new district, consists of nine residential islands each one of them is a small neighborhood, and adjacent to Al-Waar there are two Shiite villages “Al-Raqqa and Al-Mazraa”.

In addition to that, the neighborhood contains a number of public institutions such as the complex of military faculties, which includes: the Military Academy, military hospital, blood bank, institution of military construction, the criminal security branch, Al-Waleed and Homs al-Kabeer hospitals and the Exhibitions City.

For nearly a year, the regime has been implementing the policy of blockade and starvation on this area, in addition to targeting it daily by various types of weapons, which led to the decrease of residents from 800 thousand to 400, where they left to regime-controlled neighborhoods of Homs, and some resorted to safer cities such as Damascus, Hama, Lattakia and Tartous, while others preferred to go to Lebanon and Jordan.

And Since the beginning of the current month of Ramadan, a truce between the rebels and regime forces has been agreed on to enforce a cease-fire for twenty days as a first stage, provided that the next stage includes a permanent cease-fire, which some believe it will be similar to the agreement that took place in Old Homs two months ago.