Men unload flour from a Red Crescent and United Nations aid convoy in the rebel held besieged town of Hamoria area, in the eastern suburbs of Damascus, Syria, April 19, 2016. he United Nations Security Council must not allow civilians on both sides of the Syrian city of Aleppo to be cut off from humanitarian aid, the United States said on Monday, August 8 as Russian Federation accused Washington of politicizing a humanitarian issue.
Advertisement
About 250,000 people in opposition-held eastern Aleppo have been living under government siege since they were gradually encircled by Syrian government troops – backed by Iranian troops and Lebanese Hezbollah militia and Russian airpower – in the spring, with the final supply lines into the enclave cut off last month.
The eastern districts of Syria’s second city have been suffering severe food shortages since government forces cut the last road out on July 17.
He added however more than 600 government forces not able to hold on their position.
On Sunday, government-loyal media denied that the siege had been broken but did say that their forces were on the defensive.
Abdel Rahman said there were intermittent air strikes and clashes on the southern edges of the city on Sunday, where the opposition alliance overran a series of buildings in a military academy the previous evening.
The dire warning came as Syrian activists said government warplanes were bombarding opposition-held parts of the city and the United Nations called for a “humanitarian pause” in the fighting so that electricity and water networks can be repaired.
An AFP journalist said hungry residents quickly bought up the supplies.
Opposition fighters listen to a speech at an armament school after they recaptured the military facility south of Aleppo on Friday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Overnight, regime forces brought in dozens of lorries carrying food and fuel into the western neighbourhoods via the northern Castello Road, according to the Observatory.
Abdel Rahman told AFP on Monday that hundreds of opposition fighters had arrived in Aleppo from the surrounding province and neighbouring Idlib.
That number includes up to 275,000 people believed to be trapped in rebel-controlled east Aleppo, and well over one million who are in the government-controlled western part of the city, as well as those in the suburbs. If the government can regain full control of Aleppo it will hold all of Syria’s major cities.
A spokesman for Jabhat Fateh al-Sham said he was confident they could hold back President Assad’s forces: “The coming days should see an established, safe route that civilians can use”, he told the Telegraph.
“Now I’m more optimistic after the Army of Conquest’s advance”.
In another report, the Observatory said an air strike near a hospital in northwestern Syria on Saturday killed 10 people including children and damaged the hospital.
Advertisement
The multi-sided civil war in Syria, which has been raging since 2011, has drawn in regional and global powers, caused the world’s worst humanitarian emergency and attracted recruits to Islamist militancy from around the world.
