September 2016 Urum al-Kubra Aid Convoy Attack

September 2016 Urum al-Kubra aid convoy attack

Part of the Syrian Civil War
Urum al-Kubra Urum al-Kubra (Syria)
Date	19 September 2016
Time	Began sometime between 7:12 - 7:50 p.m. or at around 8 p.m.
Location	Urum al-Kubra, Aleppo Governorate, Syria
Coordinates	36°09′06″N 36°58′04″E / 36.151583°N 36.967750°E / 36.151583; 36.967750
Participants	Syrian government (per UN)
Deaths	14
Property damage	17 food-aid trucks destroyed

A U.N. and Syrian Arab Red Crescent aid convoy at a warehouse along Highway 60 in the rebel-held city of Urum al-Kubra, approximately 15 km west of the city of Aleppo in the Aleppo Governorate of Syria, was destroyed during a late Monday night attack on 19 September 2016, during the Syrian Civil War. The UN accused the Syrian government of a carrying out the attack in a "meticulously planned and ruthlessly carried out" air strike, first dropping barrel bombs, then rocketing the convoy, and finally strafing survivors with machine gun fire. Fourteen aid workers were killed.

Deir Ez Zor district is currently one of the few remaining Syrian Government strongholds in Eastern Syria. On 17 September 2016, the U.S. Coalition bombed Syrian troops in the city resulting in the deaths of between 90 and 106 Syrian Arab Army soldiers and 110 other soldiers wounded. The attack triggered "a diplomatic firestorm", with Russia calling an emergency United Nations Security Council meeting in response of the incident. Days later, on 19 September the Syrian government declared the ceasefire over effective at 7:00 p.m. (Damascus Time). Shortly afterwards that same day, beginning sometime between 7:12 - 7:50 p.m. or at around 8 p.m., the aid convoy was attacked.

According to the New York Times, the Red Crescent aid convoy of 31 trucks departed at 10:50 a.m from its origin in Syrian government controlled territory. Since the convoy was originally meant to have been accompanied by UN staff members it "was marked conspicuously with the logos of the United Nations and the Red Crescent." There were, however, no UN staff members aboard since "the Syrian government had blocked them" from leaving with the convoy. This single UN approved convoy, manned entirely by Syrian Red Crescent members, has been variously referred to as a U.N. convoy, Red Crescent convoy, and as a U.N.-Red Crescent convoy. The New York Times reported that aid workers accompanying the aid convoy were members of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, which consists of "self-governed local branches in rebel territory" while it is "state-supervised in government areas." About an hour after departing, the aid convoy reached the Syrian government controlled "Death Square" roundabout (named years ago after a car accident), the last government held checkpoint before entering rebel territory, where the convoy's Red Crescent volunteers from Aleppo switched places with Red Crescent volunteers from rebel-held Urum al-Kubra. The convoy arrived in Urum al-Kubra at around 2:00 p.m. that day. A Russian drone had been monitoring the convoy but Russian officials said that it stopped at 1:40 p.m. although rebel sources said that the drone was still in the area at around 5:00 p.m..