
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned Israel's airstrikes in Syria and called for them to stop.
"Extensive Israeli air strikes continue. These are violations of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and they must stop," he declared during a press conference on Thursday.
Israel began launching strikes following the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime, targeting strategic weapons and military infrastructure to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands.
"Syria's sovereignty, territorial unity, and integrity must be fully restored, and all acts of aggression must come to an immediate end," Guterres said.
Regarding the buffer zone between Israel and Syria, which the IDF entered after the regime collapsed, he stated: "Let me be clear: There should be no military forces in the area of separation other than UN peacekeepers – period. Israel and Syria must uphold the terms of the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement, which remains fully in force."
According to him, the United Nations is focused on facilitating an "inclusive, credible and peaceful" political transition in Syria and getting aid moving to combat one of the largest humanitarian crises in the world.
He added: "It is the obligation of the international community to stand with the people of Syria who have suffered so much. Syria's future must be shaped by its people, for its people, with the support of all of us."
Guterres also announced that he has appointed Mexican lawyer Karla Quintana to head the Independent Institution on Missing Persons in Syria and said her team must be allowed to fully carry out their mandate.
The UN General Assembly created the institution in 2023 to discover the fates of missing people and to support victims, survivors, and their families.
Quintana, a lawyer who has worked at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, ran Mexico's National Search Commission for missing persons from 2019 until 2023.