Blast in Syria kills 28 leaders of Islamist group-monitor

An explosion killed at least 28 leading members of the Islamist insurgent group Ahrar al-Sham in Syria on Tuesday and seriously wounded its leader, Hassan Aboud, according to a group that monitors the war.       

Syrian state TV reported that Aboud had been killed.        

Ahrar al-Sham is a hardline Islamist group and part of the Islamic Front alliance that has been in armed conflict with the Islamic State group. It was at one point considered the strongest insurgent group in the Syrian civil war.       

The meeting in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib was attended by 50 leaders of Ahrar al-Sham, said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.       

It was in the house of one of the leaders of Ahrar al-Sham, which activists say has received funding from Gulf states. The group aims to implement Islamic sharia law in Syria.

Earlier, Syria's state-run news agency SANA said mortar attacks on the capital Damascus and its suburbs have killed five people and wounded 22.

SANA said two people were killed in Damascus and three in the suburb of Jaramana. It added that 15 were wounded in the shelling of Damascus and seven in Jaramana.