Heavy bombardment of rebel-held areas of eastern Aleppo has killed more than 70 people and has destroyed at least 40 buildings since Friday morning, Ammar al Selmo, the head of civil defence there, told Reuters. 
 
Warplanes targeted rebel-held districts of Aleppo in a second day of intense bombardment on Friday after the Syrian army declared an offensive to fully capture what was Syria&#39;s biggest city before the war. 
 
(Reuters)

The head of civil defence told Reuters at least 40 buildings have also been destroyed since Friday morning

Heavy bombardment of rebel-held areas of eastern Aleppo has killed more than 70 people and has destroyed at least 40 buildings since Friday morning, Ammar al Selmo, the head of civil defence there, told Reuters. Warplanes targeted rebel-held districts of Aleppo in a second day of intense bombardment on Friday after the Syrian army declared an offensive to fully capture what was Syria's biggest city before the war. (Reuters)

Bombing of rebel-held Aleppo kills 70

Syrian government forces advanced on Sunday south of Aleppo city, a military source and state media said, as they pushed to once again encircle rebel neighbourhoods and reimpose a siege. 
 
&quot;The Syrian army, supported by allied forces, has total control of the armaments academy and expanded the territory it controls in the military academies zone,&quot; state news agency SANA said. 
 
Government forces have already recaptured the air force academy and rebels &quot;are now besieged in the artillery academy&quot;, a military source said. 
 
If they recapture the school, government forces could then &quot;easily take Ramussa, a suburb south of Aleppo, and reimpose a siege of the rebel districts,&quot; said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor. 
 
Aleppo, Syria&rsquo;s largest city, has been ravaged by the war that began with nationwide protests against the government led by President Bashar al-Assad in March 2011. 
 
It has been roughly divided between regime control in the west and rebel control in the east since mid-2012. 
 
On Sunday Syrian government forces and their allies recaptured areas in southwestern Aleppo which rebels seized last month, after heavy bombardments and repeated attempts to drive the insurgents back, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. 
 
The areas recaptured included the Weaponry College and the Air Force Technical College in the Ramousah area on the city&#39;s southwestern outskirts, the Observatory said. 
 
Turkey has also ramped up its offensive against the Islamic State in Syria. 
 
Turkish-backed Syrian rebels have made advances against IS militants on one hand and the US-backed Kurdish rebels on the other.&nbsp; 
 
The US has voiced concerns about Turkish strikes on Kurdish-aligned groups which it backs in its battle against the Islamic State stating that it would jeopardise the broader goal of ridding Syria of the militant group. 
 
(WION with inputs from AFP)

Syrian army has total control of the armaments academy and expanded the territory it controls in the military zone, local media reported

Syrian government forces advanced on Sunday south of Aleppo city, a military source and state media said, as they pushed to once again encircle rebel neighbourhoods and reimpose a siege. "The Syrian army, supported by allied forces, has total control of the armaments academy and expanded the territory it controls in the military academies zone," state news agency SANA said. Government forces have already recaptured the air force academy and rebels "are now besieged in the artillery academy", a military source said. If they recapture the school, government forces could then "easily take Ramussa, a suburb south of Aleppo, and reimpose a siege of the rebel districts," said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor. Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, has been ravaged by the war that began with nationwide protests against the government led by President Bashar al-Assad in March 2011. It has been roughly divided between regime control in the west and rebel control in the east since mid-2012. On Sunday Syrian government forces and their allies recaptured areas in southwestern Aleppo which rebels seized last month, after heavy bombardments and repeated attempts to drive the insurgents back, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. The areas recaptured included the Weaponry College and the Air Force Technical College in the Ramousah area on the city's southwestern outskirts, the Observatory said. Turkey has also ramped up its offensive against the Islamic State in Syria. Turkish-backed Syrian rebels have made advances against IS militants on one hand and the US-backed Kurdish rebels on the other. The US has voiced concerns about Turkish strikes on Kurdish-aligned groups which it backs in its battle against the Islamic State stating that it would jeopardise the broader goal of ridding Syria of the militant group. (WION with inputs from AFP)

Syrian regime pushes to reimpose siege south of Aleppo

More than 300 civilians have been killed in a three-week surge of fighting and bombardment in Syria&#39;s devastated Aleppo city, a monitoring group said on Saturday.&nbsp; 
 
The battle for Syria&#39;s second city has killed 333 civilians since July 31 when rebels launched a major push to break a government siege of districts under their control.&nbsp; 
 
The toll includes 165 civilians, among them 49 children, killed in opposition fire on the city&#39;s government-held western districts. &nbsp;Another 168 civilians died in Russian and regime air strikes and shelling on its rebel-controlled eastern neighbourhoods, the Observatory said. 
 
Russia has been carrying out air raids in support of President Bashar al-Assad&#39;s forces in Syria since September 2015. &nbsp;Another 109 people were killed in bombardment across the rest of Aleppo province during the same period, the Britain-based monitoring group said. 
 
Once Syria&#39;s economic hub, Aleppo city has been ripped apart by violence since mid-2012, with warplanes bombarding the east and rockets raining down on the west.&nbsp; 
 
Air strikes pounded Aleppo&#39;s southern edges on Saturday, and the intense battles there could be heard throughout the city.&nbsp;The violence rendered the rebel route out of the city, via the southern district of Ramussa, temporarily unusable, and trucks of food and other produce could not be brought into the city, the correspondent said. 
&nbsp; 
Approximately 250,000 people live in the city&#39;s eastern districts, while another 1.2 million live in its western neighbourhoods. While rebel groups are accessing the city via Ramussa, the regime is using the Castello Road to the north of the city to reach areas it controls.&nbsp; 
 
According to the Observatory, regime forces seized territory on the city&#39;s southern edges on Saturday.&nbsp;&quot;There are a lot of clashes and air strikes, and the regime made modest advances. They are trying to reinforce their positions,&quot; Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.&nbsp; 
 
The Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria for its information, says it determines what planes carried out raids according to their type, location, flight patterns and the munitions involved.&nbsp;More than 290,000 people have been killed since Syria&#39;s conflict started in March 2011, and international efforts at putting an end to the war have faltered.&nbsp; 
 
(AFP)

Once Syria's economic hub, Aleppo has been ripped apart since mid-2012, with warplanes bombarding the east and rockets firing from the west

More than 300 civilians have been killed in a three-week surge of fighting and bombardment in Syria's devastated Aleppo city, a monitoring group said on Saturday. The battle for Syria's second city has killed 333 civilians since July 31 when rebels launched a major push to break a government siege of districts under their control. The toll includes 165 civilians, among them 49 children, killed in opposition fire on the city's government-held western districts. Another 168 civilians died in Russian and regime air strikes and shelling on its rebel-controlled eastern neighbourhoods, the Observatory said. Russia has been carrying out air raids in support of President Bashar al-Assad's forces in Syria since September 2015. Another 109 people were killed in bombardment across the rest of Aleppo province during the same period, the Britain-based monitoring group said. Once Syria's economic hub, Aleppo city has been ripped apart by violence since mid-2012, with warplanes bombarding the east and rockets raining down on the west. Air strikes pounded Aleppo's southern edges on Saturday, and the intense battles there could be heard throughout the city. The violence rendered the rebel route out of the city, via the southern district of Ramussa, temporarily unusable, and trucks of food and other produce could not be brought into the city, the correspondent said. Approximately 250,000 people live in the city's eastern districts, while another 1.2 million live in its western neighbourhoods. While rebel groups are accessing the city via Ramussa, the regime is using the Castello Road to the north of the city to reach areas it controls. According to the Observatory, regime forces seized territory on the city's southern edges on Saturday. "There are a lot of clashes and air strikes, and the regime made modest advances. They are trying to reinforce their positions," Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said. The Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria for its information, says it determines what planes carried out raids according to their type, location, flight patterns and the munitions involved. More than 290,000 people have been killed since Syria's conflict started in March 2011, and international efforts at putting an end to the war have faltered. (AFP)

More than 300 civilians killed in Aleppo in last 3 weeks: Monitor

Russia said on Thursday it was ready to halt fire for 48-hour periods in Aleppo from next week, following UN calls to extend humanitarian pauses to deliver aid. 
 
&quot;Russia&#39;s defence ministry is ready to support the proposal by UN envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura regarding the introduction of weekly 48-hour &#39;humanitarian pauses&#39; (in Aleppo),&quot; defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a statement. 
 
&quot;We are ready to implement the first 48-hour &#39;humanitarian pause&#39; to deliver humanitarian aid to Aleppo residents as a &#39;pilot project&#39; already next week in order to ensure safe cargo deliveries to the city&#39;s civilians.&quot; 
 
&quot;Specific dates and times will be determined after information regarding the readiness of humanitarian convoys is received from the UN, as well as confirmation of safety guarantees from American partners,&quot; he said. 
 
Russia last week declared it would hold three-hour pause in artillery fire and airstrikes daily around the ravaged Syrian city but the UN decried this as insufficient to help the approximately 1.5 million people in Aleppo. 
 
Mistura insisted on a 48-hour halt, saying the logistics along mined and destroyed roads made access impossible in just three hours and endangered aid workers. 
 
The EU on Thursday called for an &quot;immediate halt&quot; to fighting, as the UN said aid was not reaching the besieged residents desperate for food and care. 
 
Russia has flied an air strike campaign in Syria since September to help troops loyal to long-time Moscow ally Bashar al-Assad fight rebels and Islamist jihadists in the country. 
 
(AFP) 
&nbsp;

The halts have been called for by the UN envoy to Syria

Russia said on Thursday it was ready to halt fire for 48-hour periods in Aleppo from next week, following UN calls to extend humanitarian pauses to deliver aid. "Russia's defence ministry is ready to support the proposal by UN envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura regarding the introduction of weekly 48-hour 'humanitarian pauses' (in Aleppo)," defence ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a statement. "We are ready to implement the first 48-hour 'humanitarian pause' to deliver humanitarian aid to Aleppo residents as a 'pilot project' already next week in order to ensure safe cargo deliveries to the city's civilians." "Specific dates and times will be determined after information regarding the readiness of humanitarian convoys is received from the UN, as well as confirmation of safety guarantees from American partners," he said. Russia last week declared it would hold three-hour pause in artillery fire and airstrikes daily around the ravaged Syrian city but the UN decried this as insufficient to help the approximately 1.5 million people in Aleppo. Mistura insisted on a 48-hour halt, saying the logistics along mined and destroyed roads made access impossible in just three hours and endangered aid workers. The EU on Thursday called for an "immediate halt" to fighting, as the UN said aid was not reaching the besieged residents desperate for food and care. Russia has flied an air strike campaign in Syria since September to help troops loyal to long-time Moscow ally Bashar al-Assad fight rebels and Islamist jihadists in the country. (AFP)

Russia ready to hold fire for 48-hour periods in Aleppo from next week

Russian warplanes on Tuesday flew a bombing run from an Iranian airstrip against jihadist groups in war-torn Syria, the defence ministry said. This is the first time Moscow has reported using an Iranian air base. 
 
The raids mark the first time that Russia has publicly stated that it has used a base in a Middle East country other than Syria since the Kremlin launched its bombing campaign in support of long-time ally Bashar al-Assad last September. 
 
&quot;On August 16 Tu-22M3 long-range bombers and Su-34 frontline bombers, flying with a full bomb load from the Hamedan air base (Islamic Republic of Iran), conducted a group air strike against targets of the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist groups in the provinces of Aleppo, Deir Ezzor and Idlib,&quot; the ministry said in a statement. 
 
The strikes resulted in the destruction of &quot;five large warehouses with weapons, ammunition and fuel&quot; and jihadist training camps near Aleppo, Deir Ezzor, the village of Saraqeb in the Idlib region and Al-Bab, an IS-held town in Aleppo province, the statement said. 
 
The bombing also targeted three command centres near the village of Jafra and Deir Ezzor, killing &quot;a large number of fighters&quot;, Moscow added.&nbsp;Conducting its bombing raids from Iran will dramatically cut the time it takes Moscow&#39;s long-range bombers to reach Syria. They had recently been flying from a base in southern Russia. 
 
 
US cooperation? 
 
Moscow has used warplanes stationed at its Hmeimim airbase outside the Syrian coastal city of Latakia, as well as warships stationed in the Caspian Sea and a submarine in the Mediterranean Sea to launch cruise missile attacks on Syrian territory.&nbsp;A Russian senator last week said the country was mulling plans to expand its airbase in Syria into a permanent military facility. 
 
An unnamed military source also told Interfax news agency Monday that the Russian army had sent requests to Iran and Iraq to fire cruise missiles across their airspace.&nbsp;Iran and Russia are the two firmest backers of the Assad regime, and have opposed international calls for the Syrian leader to step down in a bid to resolve a civil war that has killed more than 290,000 people since it erupted in March 2011. 
 
Iran is Assad&#39;s main regional ally and has provided steady military, financial, and political support to the regime.&nbsp;Russian deputy foreign minister Mikhail Bogdanov was in Tehran on Monday, where he discussed the &quot;high mutual interest&quot; of deeper cooperation between Russia and Iran in the Middle East, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement. 
 
Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu claimed separately in comments aired on Monday that Russia and the United States are also close to joining forces around Syria&#39;s ravaged second city of Aleppo, where Russian planes and regime forces are battling rebels for control. 
 
But in Washington, State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau refused to confirm any collaboration.&nbsp;A senior Russian diplomat in Geneva, Alexei Borodavkin, told Interfax Monday that the Russian and American militaries were in the process of &quot;agreeing some concrete practical issues&quot; regarding humanitarian aid deliveries to the city. 
 
Fighting for Aleppo has intensified after regime troops seized control of the last supply route into rebel-held areas in mid-July.&nbsp;The increased fighting has raised concerns for the estimated 1.5 million civilians still in Aleppo, including some 250,000 in rebel-held areas. 
 
(AFP)

This is the first time Moscow has ever publicly admitted it has used an air base in a Middle Eastern country other than Syria

Russian warplanes on Tuesday flew a bombing run from an Iranian airstrip against jihadist groups in war-torn Syria, the defence ministry said. This is the first time Moscow has reported using an Iranian air base. The raids mark the first time that Russia has publicly stated that it has used a base in a Middle East country other than Syria since the Kremlin launched its bombing campaign in support of long-time ally Bashar al-Assad last September. "On August 16 Tu-22M3 long-range bombers and Su-34 frontline bombers, flying with a full bomb load from the Hamedan air base (Islamic Republic of Iran), conducted a group air strike against targets of the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist groups in the provinces of Aleppo, Deir Ezzor and Idlib," the ministry said in a statement. The strikes resulted in the destruction of "five large warehouses with weapons, ammunition and fuel" and jihadist training camps near Aleppo, Deir Ezzor, the village of Saraqeb in the Idlib region and Al-Bab, an IS-held town in Aleppo province, the statement said. The bombing also targeted three command centres near the village of Jafra and Deir Ezzor, killing "a large number of fighters", Moscow added. Conducting its bombing raids from Iran will dramatically cut the time it takes Moscow's long-range bombers to reach Syria. They had recently been flying from a base in southern Russia. US cooperation? Moscow has used warplanes stationed at its Hmeimim airbase outside the Syrian coastal city of Latakia, as well as warships stationed in the Caspian Sea and a submarine in the Mediterranean Sea to launch cruise missile attacks on Syrian territory. A Russian senator last week said the country was mulling plans to expand its airbase in Syria into a permanent military facility. An unnamed military source also told Interfax news agency Monday that the Russian army had sent requests to Iran and Iraq to fire cruise missiles across their airspace. Iran and Russia are the two firmest backers of the Assad regime, and have opposed international calls for the Syrian leader to step down in a bid to resolve a civil war that has killed more than 290,000 people since it erupted in March 2011. Iran is Assad's main regional ally and has provided steady military, financial, and political support to the regime. Russian deputy foreign minister Mikhail Bogdanov was in Tehran on Monday, where he discussed the "high mutual interest" of deeper cooperation between Russia and Iran in the Middle East, the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement. Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu claimed separately in comments aired on Monday that Russia and the United States are also close to joining forces around Syria's ravaged second city of Aleppo, where Russian planes and regime forces are battling rebels for control. But in Washington, State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau refused to confirm any collaboration. A senior Russian diplomat in Geneva, Alexei Borodavkin, told Interfax Monday that the Russian and American militaries were in the process of "agreeing some concrete practical issues" regarding humanitarian aid deliveries to the city. Fighting for Aleppo has intensified after regime troops seized control of the last supply route into rebel-held areas in mid-July. The increased fighting has raised concerns for the estimated 1.5 million civilians still in Aleppo, including some 250,000 in rebel-held areas. (AFP)

Russia uses Iran's airstrip to bomb jihadists in Syria

Syria&#39;s brutal conflict has now claimed the lives of more than 290,000 people, a monitoring group said on Monday, giving its latest death toll for the devastating five-year war. 
 
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 292,817 people had been killed between March 2011 - when the conflict erupted - and the end of July. 
 
The toll represents an increase of just over 10,000 people since the monitor gave its last account on May 26. Among the dead are 84,472 civilians, including 14,711 children and 9,520 women, it said. 
 
The Observatory also documented the deaths of 50,548 non-jihadist rebels and Kurdish militiamen. Another 49,547 extremist militants including non-Syrians were killed. A total of 104,656 pro-regime fighters were killed, among them 57,909 soldiers and 1,306 militants from the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, which is fighting on behalf of Damascus 
 
The monitor said that 3,594 of those killed have been unidentified 
 
The Britain-based Observatory depends on a network of sources inside Syria to gather its information on the conflict. It estimates that thousands&nbsp;of people are missing or have disappeared into detention centres run by various armed groups. 
 
(AFP)

The death toll represents an increase of over 10,000 people since the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights gave its last account on May 26

Syria's brutal conflict has now claimed the lives of more than 290,000 people, a monitoring group said on Monday, giving its latest death toll for the devastating five-year war. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 292,817 people had been killed between March 2011 - when the conflict erupted - and the end of July. The toll represents an increase of just over 10,000 people since the monitor gave its last account on May 26. Among the dead are 84,472 civilians, including 14,711 children and 9,520 women, it said. The Observatory also documented the deaths of 50,548 non-jihadist rebels and Kurdish militiamen. Another 49,547 extremist militants including non-Syrians were killed. A total of 104,656 pro-regime fighters were killed, among them 57,909 soldiers and 1,306 militants from the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, which is fighting on behalf of Damascus The monitor said that 3,594 of those killed have been unidentified The Britain-based Observatory depends on a network of sources inside Syria to gather its information on the conflict. It estimates that thousands of people are missing or have disappeared into detention centres run by various armed groups. (AFP)

More than 290,000 killed in Syria war, says rights group

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