Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.

A top United Nations official has described conditions in a Palestinian refugee camp in the Syrian capital as "shocking."

Filippo Grandi, head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which cares for Palestinian refugees, visited the Yarmouk camp in Damascus on Sunday. He said he was "deeply disturbed and shaken by what I observed" in the camp, where up to 20,000 people have been trapped for eight months by an army siege.

The UNRWA released a photo taken on Jan. 31, above, which shows a sea of people lining up to receive food supplies.

President Bashar Assad's administration and to a lesser extent rebels fighting to overthrow him have been accused of preventing food and medical care from reaching people in besieged areas of the country.

On Saturday the U.N. Security Council passed a landmark resolution demanding an end to restrictions on humanitarian operations in Syria.

— Reuters contributed to this report