“The U.N. sounded the alarm on Saturday about the plight of women and children in Syria’s Homs, urging all parties in the conflict to enable access to some 400,000 trapped civilians,” Agence France-Presse reports. “‘The situation of women and children in the Syrian city of Homs is rapidly deteriorating,’ UNICEF said in a statement, adding that ‘new checkpoints are preventing more supplies from entering’ the neighborhood of Al-Waer,” the news service writes. “Around 400,000 civilians, mostly women and children, who were forced to flee other areas of Homs have sought refuge in Al-Waer, and are now ‘living in partially constructed buildings, schools and other public buildings,’ Lake said,” according to AFP, which adds, “Lake called on ‘all parties to facilitate immediate safe access to these families so we can provide life-saving assistance, and to allow those families currently trapped in Al-Waer who wish to leave to do so in safety and in dignity'” (8/3).