Ukraine-Russia: Calls for ‘Berlin airlift’ style drop of humanitarian aid

Humanitarian corridors to allow aid to be sent to Ukrainian communities under attack should be created in the style of the Berlin airlift of 1948, Ukrainian groups have urged.

Local mayors have called for humanitarian corridors to be open to aid as some towns and cities report being short of basic water and food supplies. They warned while there is not safe passage for humanitarian organisations, aid would not be delivered to those in need.

The calls come as the International Red Cross warned food and water supplies are reaching “dangerously low levels” in the besieged port city of Mariupol, where a maternity hospital was bombed on Wednesday, killing three people, including a child. A total of 17 people were also injured, including staff and patients, according to local officials.

Sasha Volkov, the organisation's delegation head in the city, said the situation was so dire that people have "started to attack each other for food".

A picture shows the ruin of a deserted home, damaged by Russian shelling, near the frontline village of Horenka, north of Kyiv, on March 10, 2022, 15 days after Russia launched a military invasion on Ukraine. - Many of the damaged homes are deserted, with listless dogs and cats wandering among the broken glass, begging food from strangers and nosing at the frozen water in their bowls.

He said while "some sort of a black market with vegetables" has emerged in Mariupol, "you can’t find meat or something like this".

In a Telegram post, the city council said homes were being hit by bombs in a new round of attacks on Thursday.

During the Soviet blockade of West Berlin in 1948 to 1949, Allied cargo planes would use open air corridors over the Soviet occupation zone to deliver food, fuel and other goods to the people who lived in the western part of the city. This project, code-named “Operation Vittles” by the American military, was known as the “Berlin airlift”.

At the beginning of the operation, the planes delivered about 5,000 tons of supplies to West Berlin every day. By the end, those loads had increased to about 8,000 tons of supplies per day. The Allies carried about 2.3 million tons of cargo in all over the course of the airlift.

A spokeswoman for the Ukrainian volunteer Journalists and Communicators initiative, a grassroots group set up by more than 100 Ukrainian communications professionals, said: “With current humanitarian ways not efficient, Ukraine is in dire need of alternative roots of aid delivery. A new take of the Berlin Airlift could be a way to solve at least the most dire parts of the crisis, providing effective support for thousands of civilians in Ukraine.

"It is not such a radical solution as military aid, but a quite reliable insurance against the most radical actions of Russia, which it can resort to due to the persistent resistance of Ukrainians fighting for their lives, home and freedom."

Mayors of towns struggling for supplies echoed calls for humanitarian corridors.

“I ask everyone who makes decisions – make a green corridor for departure. Make a humanitarian corridor for the delivery of humanitarian aid. There is humanitarian aid, but who will take it to us under artillery fire?” said Izyum’s mayor Volodymyr Matsokin on his Facebook page.

Locals say there is no food, water, light, gas, heat and no phone coverage in the town, in the east of Ukraine.

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