Provide safety to aid workers in Aleppo: UN

Syria’s government would also need to overturn its decision last week to refuse to allow aid into the eastern part of the city, where the UN estimates 275,000 civilians and 8,000 rebel fighters are trapped. “We need assurances from all parties to the conflict, not just a unilateral announcement that this will happen. We need everybody to give us those assurances before it is immediately useful for us to do anything meaningful,” UN spokesman Jens Laerke said. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it was still unclear how much time would be needed to get security guarantees from all sides, including from rebel fighters. Russia said on Monday that coalition forces would pause their attacks on Aleppo for eight hours on Thursday to allow civilians and rebels to leave the city, and on Monday they halted all air strikes, two days ahead of time.