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S/2018/60 18-00842 9/20 24. The United Nations inter-agency convoy plan for October and November was further extended until December. Under the plan, access to 33 locations in besieged and hard-to-reach areas was requested, with the objective of reaching a total of 1,206,000 people. Inter-agency convoys are prepared for areas with multisectoral needs where access is limited, to ensure that United Nations support is needs-based. In December, only two inter-agency convoys could be dispatched, reaching some 60,000 people in need in two hard-to-reach locations (see table 2 for a list of inter-agency convoys deployed in December). No convoys were authorized for deployment to besieged locations. The total number of people reached under the October-December plan was 398,950, or 33 per cent of the total number of people to whom access had originally been requested under the plan. This number does not include convoys carrying supplies delivered by other humanitarian actors. Table 2 Inter-agency cross-line humanitarian convoys, December 2017 Date Location Requested target (number of beneficiaries) Number of beneficiaries reached Type of assistance 14 December Hulah 71 000 50 000 Multisectoral 14 December Harbinafsih 18 000 10 000 Multisectoral 25. Individual agencies continued to submit requests for single-agency deliveries to locations throughout the country during the reporting period. Single-agency deliveries are undertaken in areas where access is less challenging. In December, the World Food Programme submitted 1,501 official requests to the authorities to obtain facilitation letters for the transport of food assistance to locations throughout the country, of which 1,500 were approved. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees submitted 60 facilitation letters for the movement of core relief items and livelihood kits, of which 58 were approved and 2 were rejected, with security concerns cited as the reason. Both international and Syrian non-governmental organizations continued to undertake needs assessments and to provide support (including medical, educational, psychosocial and protection services) in besieged and hard-to-reach locations, under challenging circumstances, in accordance with humanitarian principles