UN calls for more than $150m to provide urgent relief in Syria

Aid groups need $150m (€120.04m) to provide urgent relief to 250,000 people displaced by separate offensives by the Syrian government outside Damascus and Turkish-led forces in the north, a UN Syria official said.

UN co-ordinator Ali al-Za'atari said some 80,000 people have fled the government's offensive in the eastern Ghouta region east of Damascus, where shelling and airstrikes have killed some 1,600 people in five weeks.