REPORT: Aleppo battle kills dozens, air strikes force rebel retreat

Rita Khoury Author: Rita Khoury
Breaking Headlines
2016-05-04 | 04:40
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REPORT: Aleppo battle kills dozens, air strikes force rebel retreat
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9min
REPORT: Aleppo battle kills dozens, air strikes force rebel retreat
Dozens of people were killed in a day-long battle between Syrian rebels and government forces in western Aleppo that was still going on intermittently on Wednesday, with rebels saying they were forced to retreat by heavy aerial bombing.

A rebel attack in and around the Jamiyat al-Zahraa area of western Aleppo had threatened the army's defensive lines around government-held areas of a city at the epicenter of a recent escalation in the five-year-old civil war.

In Geneva, a senior United Nations humanitarian official said the Syrian government was refusing U.N. demands to deliver aid to hundreds of thousands of civilians trapped by the fighting, including many in Aleppo.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said dozens had been killed on both sides in what it described as the most intense battle in the area in a year. Government forces were reinforced by allies from Lebanon's Hezbollah, it said.

A rebel fighter said about 40 government fighters had been killed, while rebel losses stood at 10 dead. A military source denied there had been heavy casualties in army ranks, but said dozens of civilians and many rebels had been killed.

Rebel sources said insurgents had at one point captured a strategic location known as Family House, but later lost it after the government side brought in reinforcements.

A pro-government military strategist said the offensive failed to breach key army defense and supply lines in Aleppo, Syria's biggest city and commercial hub before the war.

"The assault was repelled, foiling a major attempt by these terrorist groups to make a breakthrough into the heart of Aleppo," Hassan Hassan said on state-run Ikhbariyah TV.

A rebel source said sustained air strikes on insurgents arrayed along the fringes of government-held Jamiyat al Zahraa had forced their retreat.

"The air force is the only weapon that exhausts us, especially (the use of) barrel bombing," said Mohammad al Sulaiman, a field commander from the Free Syrian Army's Liwa Fursan al Haq brigade.

Rebels said jets believed to be both Russian and Syrian continued to pound their positions near Jamiyat al Zahraa. Other air and artillery strikes hit rebel emplacements around the Castello highway, the main supply route into rebel-held Aleppo.

MOSTLY CIVILIAN CASUALTIES IN ALEPPO

Most of the people killed in Aleppo in the last few weeks have been civilians. The Observatory said 279 civilians had been killed in Aleppo by bombardment since April 22 - 155 of them in opposition-held areas and 124 in government-held districts.

Russia turned the tide of the war in Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's favor with a campaign of heavy aerial bombing launched last September, while the United States and some allies have provided limited support to non-Islamist rebel forces.

The military escalation in Aleppo wrecked the first major ceasefire of the war, sponsored by Washington and Moscow, which had held since February.

In Berlin, Syrian opposition figure Riad Hijab, speaking before talks with the German and French foreign ministers and the U.N.'s Syria envoy, said a general ceasefire was needed across Syria, rather than one limited to specific areas.

The current formula is not working, said Hijab, adding that the opposition had reached a dead end with Assad in peace talks. "There needs to be an agreement according to U.N. Security Council Resolution 2268 that includes all Syrian areas where moderate opposition exists," he said.

On Wednesday, Russia blamed the United States and an upsurge in violence by Islamist Nusra Front militants for a failure to extend a ceasefire plan to Aleppo the previous day.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday that the deal covering Aleppo was close and that the Russian and U.S. militaries might announce a decision "in the coming hours". But such a local truce, also known as "a regime of calm," never materialized.

Russian news agencies quoted Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov as saying Russian and U.S. military officers were holding "active consultations" with the Assad government and "moderate opposition" on how to salvage the truce plan.
 
Syria withholds aid to 900,000 people, risks new siege in Aleppo -UN

Syria's government is refusing U.N. demands to deliver aid to 905,000 people including in Aleppo, the city at the center of an eruption of fighting in the past two weeks, U.N. humanitarian adviser Jan Egeland said on Wednesday.
 
"We seem to be having new possible besieged areas on our watch, we are having hundreds of relief workers unable to move in Aleppo," he told reporters after chairing a weekly meeting of nations supporting the Syria peace process.
 
"It is a disgrace to see that while the population of Aleppo is bleeding, their options to flee have never been more difficult than now."
 
The first major ceasefire in Syria's five-year civil war, sponsored by the United States and Russia, was struck in February but has virtually collapsed in recent weeks, with  Aleppo bearing the brunt of the renewed bloodshed.
 
The humanitarian task force chaired by Egeland enjoyed some success in opening up access for aid in April, ensuring it reached 40 percent of people in besieged areas in Syria, compared to 5 percent in the whole of 2015.
 
It has also overseen 22 airdrops of aid into the eastern city of Deir al-Zor, where 110,000 people are besieged by Islamic State insurgents, Egeland said, about half the previous estimate of 200,000 people trapped there.
 
But progress has stalled and requests to the Syrian government to greenlight aid convoys to six remaining besieged areas in May have largely fallen on deaf ears.
 
"We got an answer back that is not good news," Egeland said. "Half of the places in the May plan were not accepted, including east Aleppo." That part of the city is under rebel control.
 
President Bashar al-Assad's government put major conditions on aid to another 25 percent of the people the United Nations had hoped to help, Egeland said.
 
Among those getting a partial approval was the town of Daraya, where 4,000 people including 500 children are on "the brink of starvation". The government said baby milk and school supplies could go in, Egeland said.
 
"But to some extent it's an improvement - the government earlier said there were only terrorists in Daraya and they are now admitting there are children there."
 
The United Nations has appealed to Assad's government to change its mind and allow aid without conditions to all places that were refused or got only a partial green light, he said.
 
French foreign minister blames Assad for breaking truce in Aleppo

French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said at the start of talks on the Syrian crisis in Berlin that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government bore full responsibility for undermining the ceasefire in Aleppo.
 
"What is happening in Aleppo is a tragedy that requires a stronger reaction. It is a terrible drama that is happening there with victims, and the regime in Damascus bears full responsibility for what is happening and this means undermining the ceasefire, and goes all the way to destroying hospitals, killing women and children, civilians and doctors," he said.
 
He also called for a meeting on Monday in France of 10 countries, including Arab states, involved in ceasefire talks, adding: "Everything must be done to get back to the ceasefire path."
 
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, hosting the talks which also include Syrian opposition figure Riad Hijab and the U.N.'s Syria envoy, said every effort had to be made to de-escalate the situation in Syria and there was no military solution to the crisis.


REUTERS
 
 
For more details, watch the full report in the video above.

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