The Guardian: Syria: save the civilians
“…If humanitarian access could be extended to other cities and towns [in Syria other than Homs], we might be able to speak of a real improvement at a time when, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the pro-opposition monitoring group, Syrians are being killed at the fastest rate since the conflict began. Such an extension would be facilitated if the U.N. Security Council could reach agreement on a resolution on humanitarian aid access in Syria. But Russia has said it will veto the resolution in its present form, which it claims could be used as justification for military strikes against President Bashar al-Assad’s government. … Russia and Iran could change the balance by reducing aid, but Russia shows no sign of doing so, and Iran is not even at Geneva. Yet humanitarian access could be largely insulated from the fighting, and both sides have a clear duty to give it a real chance” (2/12).