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Russian airstrikes hit targets in Idlib
[ARANews] Idlib – Russian warplanes on Sunday launched several airstrikes on Syria’s northwestern Idlib Governorate, killing and wounding dozens of people, activists reported.At least 44 civilians were killed and dozens of others wounded in the airstrikes, which targeted rebel-held populated areas in Idlib. The Russian airstrikes reportedly hit the towns of Kafr Nabal and Maarat al-Numan. “Kafr Nabal was hit by four airstrikes. At least 21 civilians were killed, including children,” local media activist Hassan al-Omari told ARA News, adding that more than 30 others were injured in the Russian strikes on Sunday evening. The air raids targeted a crowded marketplace and a residential complex in the town. “Rescue teams are still searching for survivors under the rubble,” al-Omari reported. In Maarat al-Numan, dozens of casualties were reported after Russian fighter jets hit the town with some six airstrikes. “So far dead bodies of 23 victims were pulled from under the rubble,” human rights activist Ahad al-Khalil told ARA News in Maarat al-Numan. “Also, dozens of civilians were injured in the air raids. They were immediately moved to a field hospital for treatment,” the source reported. Russia, a key supporter to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, began a military intervention in in Syria in September 2015, unde rthe pretext of fighting terrorist groups. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said in November that their forces had begun a “major operation” targeting rebel-controlled areas in Homs and Idlib. Arab News sez the death toll is 46 BEIRUT, Lebanon: At least 46 people were killed in suspected Russian air strikes on several areas of Idlib province in northwest Syria on Sunday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The Britain-based monitor said those killed in the strikes, on three locations in the province, were mostly civilians. The Observatory says it determines whose planes carried out raids according to their type, location, flight patterns and the munitions involved. The toll included 26 civilians, among them three children, killed in the town of Kafr Nabal, and another 18 people who were killed in the town of Maaret Al-Numan. In Kafr Nabal, an eyewitness told AFP that warplanes carried out several strikes. “Six strikes hit houses and a crowded local market,” Hossam Hosber said. In Maaret Al-Numan, an AFP photographer saw local residents and White Helmets rescue workers trying to reach survivors in the rubble at a vegetable market hit in a strike. The Observatory said most of those killed in Maaret Al-Numan were civilians, but that the identities of four of the dead were still being confirmed. The monitor also reported two additional deaths, one in an earlier strike on Maaret Al-Numan and another in Al-Naqir, also in Idlib. And it said six civilians, four of them children, had been killed in a government barrel bomb attack on the town of Al-Tamanah in the south of Idlib. Russia began a military intervention in support of President Bashar Assad’s government in September 2015, and says it is targeting “terrorists.” It has dismissed reports of civilian casualties in its strikes and says it only target militants. In November, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Russian forces had begun a “major operation” targeting Idlib and Homs provinces. Idlib province is mostly controlled by a powerful rebel alliance known as the Army of Conquest, which groups Islamist factions with jihadists of Fateh Al-Sham Front, formerly Al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate. Most of Homs province is controlled by the Syrian government, but small parts of the countryside in the region are held by a range of rebel groups. More than 300,000 people have been killed in Syria since the country’s conflict began in March 2011. Posted by: badanov 2016-12-05 |
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