Asia

Home page

Asia

Red Cross opens hotlines to try to reunite Syrian families

13 December 2024 21:31 (UTC +04:00)

The Red Cross said on Friday it had opened two new telephone hotlines to try to reunite Syrians who have been missing for years with their families, but warned that many cases will take months or years to resolve, APA reports citing Reuters.

Stephan Sakalian, head of delegation for ICRC in Syria, told reporters that it had opened two hotlines this week: one for prisoners and one for families to try to connect them.

"We can provide them with mental health and psychosocial support ... we can even help them financially if they need to be reunited," he told a Geneva press briefing via video link from Damascus. Legal aid and healthcare are also available, an ICRC statement said.

"Let's make no mistake: giving answers to people will take weeks, months and maybe years, given the amount of information to process," he said. "The work is tremendous," he added.