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Syrian army & rebels agree to end Daraya siege

“They headed to Idlib inhabited area on buses”, the ministry said in a daily bulletin posted on its website.

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The mass relocation of the suburb’s residents reflects the government’s ongoing military strategy to break up Sunni population areas, weakening the rebellion against it.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a brother and sister were killed in the airstrikes that left their bodies badly charred.

According to the United Nations, almost 600,000 live under siege across Syria, most surrounded by government forces, although rebels and jihadists also use the tactic. It has been besieged for months with only intermittent worldwide aid deliveries getting through.

Syrian Civil War map: Who controls what? .

The deal to evacuate the town was announced on Thursday by Syrian state news agency SANA.

The declaration Saturday comes only a day after the evacuation of almost 5,000 residents and fighters from the suburb began.

A deal on fighting jihadists in Syria could help lead to an end to fighting between the army and its militia allies on one side and non-jihadist rebels opposed to President Bashar al-Assad.

A Syrian military source told Reuters all civilians would leave the city and the army would enter it. People would be allowed to return to their homes once the area’s infrastructure had been rebuilt.

The rebels are largely from two groups, Ajnad al-Sham and the Martyrs of Islam.

Daraya council said on Facebook that civilians would be taken to the government-held town of Hrajela in Western Ghouta, outside Damascus.

The first bus with rebels and their families emerged from inside Daraya on Friday, surrounded by armed Syrian army troops.

Gaining control of Daraya is a boost for Mr Assad nd increases the security of his seat of power in the capital.

Friday’s remarks by Binali Yildirim follow Turkey’s incursion into Syria.

Civilians should be relocated only if their safety could be guaranteed and it was on a voluntary basis, they said. The group claimed to have captured two Kurdish fighters.

There was no immediate comment from the Syria Democratic Forces, the USA -backed Kurdish-affiliated forces. “For so long Daraya is all I have known, and I am feeling lost and distraught at having to leave”, Ahmad said. US -backed Kurdish-led fighters seized the town of Manbij from IS militants earlier this month, raising concerns they will advance toward Jarablus along the border with Turkey.

“It is imperative that people of Daraya are protected in any evacuation that takes place, and that this takes place voluntarily”, de Mistura, who leads United Nations political and humanitarian efforts in Syria, said in a statement after holding talks with Kerry and Lavrov.

Regime forces taunted rebels evacuating the town by waving their weapons in celebration and chanting pro-regime slogans.

Elsewhere at least 15 people died in barrel bombings in Aleppo, reports say.

Turkish police and firefighters are parked near a damaged police headquarters after a vehicle bomb killed 11 Turkish police officers and injured 45 people on Friday in Cizre, southeastern Turkey. For years, government helicopters conducted a brutal aerial campaign, pounding the suburb with barrel bombs – large containers packed with fuel, explosives and scraps of metal. The government denies it uses barrel bombs. Last week its only hospital was hit, rebels and aid workers said.

It called the raids “a unsafe escalation”, and said there had been injuries.

“We find the agreement unsettling”, said Elise Baker, research coordinator at Physicians for Human Rights, a USA -based group. Turkish officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

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Turkey, a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation member and part of the US-led coalition against Islamic State, has seen a series of deadly bombings this year blamed on the radical Islamists.

Syrians prepare to evacuate from Daraya a blockaded Damascus suburb on Friday in