NGO: 130,000 Flee North Syria District amid Heavy Bombing

Tens of thousands of people have escaped from the Al Safira district in northern Syria, fleeing non-stop heavy bombing in a "massive exodus", Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Friday.

The non-governmental organisation, which has staff on the ground in the conflict-ridden country, said some 130,000 people had fled the district in the northern province of Aleppo, including almost all those who lived in the town of Al Safira.

These add to the millions who have been driven from their homes since a brutal crackdown on Arab Spring-inspired protests in March 2011 escalated into a civil war that has now left some 115,000 people dead.

"Faced with the magnitude of the needs of these displaced people, humanitarian aid is insufficient," MSF said in a statement.

Marie-Noelle Rodrigue, head of operations at MSF, said the "extremely violent attacks" in Al Safira since October 8 had forced those who had already fled violence in other places to escape again.

"These people arrive in areas that already host a large number of displaced people, where the rare humanitarian players that are present are faced with huge needs," she said in the statement.

According to MSF, new arrivals in the town of Manbij -- to the northeast of Al Safira -- were crammed into nearby farms, a makeshift camp on a parking lot that only has one latrine, or unfinished buildings that have no doors or windows -- just as winter approaches.

The organisation also deplored the targeting of medical establishments, citing a field hospital that was destroyed by a barrel of TNT thrown from a helicopter on October 21.

"The United Nations as well as countries that have an influence in this conflict must show the same determination in settling the issue of humanitarian aid than in the issue of chemical arms," said MSF head Mego Terzian.

The U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution in September demanding the destruction of Syria's entire chemical arsenal, after the regime's alleged use of poison gas on its own people.