Regime warplanes target Raqqa as US speculates aid to Syrian opposition

 
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday outside assistance given to the Syrian opposition should strengthen moderate forces within it.
   
Kerry was speaking at a news conference on a visit to Qatar, a Gulf Arab state that provides support to Syrian opposition forces.
                   
This as Syrian warplanes bombarded the city of Raqqa on Tuesday, a day after it was captured by rebel fighters, opposition campaigners and a resident said.             

"The centre of the city is being bombarded by warplanes. I counted 60 rockets," the resident said, adding hospitals had issued calls to donate blood as casualties mounted. 
                      
Opposition sources and residents said rebel fighters captured the northeastern city on Monday and toppled a statue of President Bashar al-Assad's father, in what would be the first major city to be captured since the revolt erupted against four decades of Assad family rule in March 2011.             

All of Raqqa except a military intelligence compound fell and hundreds of Assad's forces fled east in the direction of Iraq and west to Aleppo, according to local sources.            

The rebels arrested the governor and Baath Party head, at least one intelligence chief and the provincial police commander, a major blow to loyalist cadres entrusted with pacifying the east, the sources said.            

Separately, the Syrian state television announced on Tuesday that Syria's former armed forces chief of staff and peace negotiating team member, retired General Hikmat Shehabi, died today at the age of 82.        

Reasons of his death are yet to be revealed.           

Shehabi, a native of the northern province of Idlib, which has fallen into Syrian opposition hands since a revolution against Syrian Presdient Bachar al-Assad's regime broke out in March 2011, was a member of Syria's negotiating team with Israel in the 1990s.           


On the ground:        

Jordan's King Abdullah II has called on Tuesday  world nations to help Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon shoulder "the tremendous burden" of caring for hundreds of thousands of refugees who have fled the violence in Syria.              

Abdullah said  Turkey and Jordan would continue to provide assistance but urged the international community to contribute. The king was addressing reporters during a visit to Turkey.                

The United Nations says there are some 925,000 displaced Syrians around the region and the number could increase to half a million this month.                 

Jordan is hosting more than 420,000 Syrian refugees, of whom 110,000 are sheltered in a desert camp near its northern border with Syria. Turkey is housing more than 180,000 refugees in 17 camps, while Lebanon has some 317,000.                        


REUTERS/AP/LBCI