Aleppo (Syria): Syrian rebels has renewed their bid to break a government siege of eastern Aleppo, shelling regime-held parts of the city hours before a brief Russian-declared ceasefire was due to begin.
State media yesterday said at least 12 people had been killed in rebel rocket and gunfire on regime-controlled neighbourhoods, after an assault that began with a double car bomb attack.
Rebels have been battling for nearly a week in a desperate bid to break the three-month siege but have so far been unable to push through government lines in western Aleppo.
The opposition forces yesterdayannounced a new phase in their assault on government forces in the city’s western outskirts.
“We have started the second phase in our fight to break the siege with heavy artillery fire” on several neighbourhoods, rebel fighter Abu Hamza told AFP on the edges of Aleppo.
Thick black smoke billowed out of the Dahiyet al-Assad district, where rebels had lit tyres to try to shield themselves from warplanes circling above.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said the “most intense fighting” was on the edges of the Halab al-Jadida neighbourhood.
The clashes on Aleppo’s western outskirts could be heard in the city’s eastern districts, an AFP correspondent there said.
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 air strikes in areas where clashes were underway, but that the rebel-held neighbourhoods in the east of the city were largely quiet.
Syrian state news agency SANA said at least 12 people had been killed and more than 200 wounded in rebel fire yesterday.
The Observatory put the toll at 15 dead, saying four children were among them, bringing to 69 the total number of civilians killed in rebel fire since Friday, including 23 children.
State media also said eight people were being treated for suffocation after “terrorists fired poisonous gases” at the village of Minyan west of Aleppo.
Once Syria’s economic powerhouse, Aleppo has been divided since mid-2012 between government control in the west and rebels in the east.
A Russian-backed army offensive in September to recapture the whole city killed hundreds of civilians and hit infrastructure including the east’s few remaining health facilities.
It provoked international recriminations, particularly against Russia, with the EU accusing it of actions that “may amount to war crimes”.
Moscow has rejected the criticism and in late October declared a unilateral three-day ceasefire, during which it urged civilians and rebels to leave east Aleppo.