BEIRUT — As a U.N. cease-fire failed to take hold in Syria, Russia on Monday ordered a daily “humanitarian pause” to allow civilians to evacuate an embattled rebel-held enclave near Damascus, while airstrikes continued and Syrian ground forces fought to push into the besieged area from the west.
But civilians caught in the violence mocked Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order of a limited, five-hour daily truce.
“It is like legitimizing the strikes on civilians,” said activist Firas Abdullah, a resident of Douma, a town in the region where at least 13 members of a family were killed Monday when their home collapsed after an airstrike.
“They will be so kind to grant us a mere five hours when they will not bomb us. Then the rest of the day, they will bomb us as usual. It is like a permission to kill,” Abdullah said.
A weekend resolution approved by the U.N. Security Council for a 30-day cease-fire across Syria failed to stop the carnage in the eastern Ghouta region that has killed more than 500 people since last week.
At least 34 people were killed Monday by airstrikes and shelling, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The U.N. estimates that nearly 400,000 people live in dire conditions from the siege in eastern Ghouta, which has been under intensive bombing by government forces for weeks.
Other Ghouta residents also scoffed at the Russian move, saying it reminded them of a similar one for a besieged eastern district of Aleppo in 2016.