Syria Child Evacuees May be Used as bargaining Chips, UN Warns

A senior UN official says he fears children waiting to be evacuated from the besieged rebel-held Eastern Ghouta area near the Syrian capital, Damascus, are being used as bargaining chips, according to BBC. 

The UN's humanitarian co-ordinator, Jan Egeland, told the BBC he believed that rebels had agreed to free government workers in exchange for the children.

Another 12 patients were evacuated on Wednesday, following four on Tuesday.

Thirteen more urgent cases are expected to be evacuated on Thursday.

News of the latest evacuations from the Eastern Ghouta came in a tweet from the Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS), a medical relief organisation that supports hospitals in rebel-held Syria.

However, SAMS advocacy manager Mohamad Katoub told the BBC that it was hard to keep up with who needed to be evacuated as people continued to die.

"The last one was a girl from the list, from the 29. This morning, when the local staff reached the family to tell them that finally the approval to evacuate your little daughter arrived, the family said that our daughter died a few days ago."

Mr Katoub also tweeted that a 13th patient had refused to be evacuated on Wednesday because he was concerned about being arrested by the Syrian government. "No safety guarantees were given to the patients," he added.

About 400,000 residents in the war-torn district have been under siege by government forces since 2013.

"Let's hope that the agreements are good when they come," Mr Egeland told the BBC.

"There can also be bad agreements. It is a not a good agreement if they exchange sick children for detainees that means children become bargaining chips in some tug of war. That shouldn't happen. They have a right to the evacuation and we...