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Syrian rebels renew Aleppo strikes before Russia truce
ALEPPO: Syrian rebels renewed their bid to break a government siege on eastern Aleppo on Thursday, shelling regime-held parts of the city, hours before a brief Russian-declared cease-fire was due to begin.State media said at least 12 people had been killed in rebel rocket and gunfire on western neighborhoods, after an assault that began with a double car bomb attack. Meanwhile, the spokesman for a Syrian Kurdish-Arab alliance known as the Syrian Democratic Forces said the group would lead the fight to recapture the Daesh group stronghold of Raqqa. But he stressed that they rejected any role for Turkey, which in August began a military operation inside northern Syria targeting both Daesh and Kurdish fighters. In Aleppo, rebels were engaged in fierce fighting with government forces in several districts on the western outskirts, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said. The Britain-based group said the “most intense fighting” was on the edges of the Halab Al-Jadida neighborhood. “If they take Halab Al-Jadida, they could advance toward the military complexes,” Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP. The clashes on Aleppo’s western outskirts could be heard in the city’s eastern districts, an AFP correspondent there said. Rebels including former Al-Qaeda affiliate the Fateh Al-Sham Front began as assault on west Aleppo on Friday in a bid to break a three-month government siege. No aid has reached eastern Aleppo city’s more than 250,000 residents since early July, and there are reports of shortages and price hikes. The Observatory said government forces were carrying out airstrikes in areas where clashes were underway, but that the rebel-held neighborhoods in the east of the city were largely quiet. Posted by: badanov 2016-11-05 |
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