"An Il-76 plane will take off at 10:00 a.m. Moscow time [6:00 a.m. GMT] from the Ramenskoye airport in the Moscow Region to Larnaca airport in Cyprus," the spokesman for the Emergency Situations Ministry said. "It will deliver 101 30-bed tents, about 2,500 half-woolen blankets and 1,500 sets of dishes."
The first Russian plane with humanitarian aid for Lebanon arrived in Cyprus on August 9. The cargo handed over to UN World Food Program officials comprised 47 30-bed tents, 2,300 blankets, 1,000 mattresses, and the same number of pillows.
UN aid workers have used sea routes to deliver aid to southern Lebanon for security reasons and because most roads and bridges have been destroyed by Israeli aviation in five weeks of fighting with the Lebanon-based Hizbollah radical movement.
The third and fourth planes will deliver to Cyprus food, medicine and medical equipment and portable electricity power generating stations on August 21 and 23.
Although a ceasefire is now in place, the military operations claimed the lives of almost 1,000 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and forced about a quarter of the country's population to flee their homes. About 100 Israelis, most of them soldiers, also lost their lives in the fighting.
