Mark Lowcock, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, on Thursday called on the Security Council to take "urgent and concrete action" as violence escalates in Syria.

"When an entire generation is robbed of its future, when hospital attacks have become the new normal, when siege of entire cities and neighborhoods have become a lasting reality for hundreds of thousands of people, the international community must take urgent and concrete action," Lowcock told the Security Council.

"What we need is a sustained cessation of hostilities, and we need it desperately -- a cessation of violence that will enable the immediate, safe, unimpeded and sustained delivery of humanitarian aid and services, the evacuation of the critically sick and wounded and an alleviation of the suffering of the Syrian people."

Heavy shelling and aerial bombardment on multiple communities in the rebel-held enclave of Eastern Ghouta reportedly continued over the past 24 hours, killing at least 50 people and wounding at least 200 others, said Lowcock.

The death toll since Monday is close to 300, he said.

"Eastern Ghouta is a living example of an entirely known, predictable, and preventable humanitarian disaster unfolding before our eyes," he said.

Violence is hampering UN efforts to deliver humanitarian relief to people in need, he said.

Since Dec. 1, 2017, the United Nations has deployed only three cross-line convoys, reaching 67,200 people. Only 7,200 of those were in besieged areas, less than two percent of the overall besieged population, he said.

In the past three months, only 22,000 people were reached per months, compared with an average of 175,000 people a month in the first 11 months of 2017, he said.

In the past few days, Syrian government troops have intensified efforts to retake Eastern Ghouta close to capital Damascus, the last major rebel stronghold in the country. 

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