Shortages kill more than 300 in Syria in 2014

Shortages of food and medicine caused the deaths of more than 300 civilians, including about 100 children, in areas besieged by the Syrian regime in 2014, a monitoring group said Saturday.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said many of the 313 victims -- who included 34 women -- had died in the flashpoint Eastern Ghouta region, a rebel stronghold under army siege for a year and a half.
It denounced the sieges as a "war crime" and said they violated a Security Council resolution which calls for the delivery of aid to regions in need.
An estimated 200,000 people have been killed in Syria's nearly four-year war, and half the population have been forced to flee their homes.
This month the UN appealed for $8.4 billion to provide emergency aid and longer-term help to nearly 18 million people in Syria and across the region hit by the conflict.