The latest ceasefire has offered some respite from violence in the civil war, which has killed an estimated 430,000 people since 2011 and touched off an global refugee crisis.
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Earlier Monday, before the United Nations convoy was struck, U.S. officials said that any decisions about the ceasefire would be made between Washington and Moscow, which brokered the deal last week.
It is unclear how much longer the ceasefire will continue beyond its last agreed extension to 11:59 p.m. local time Sunday (4:59 p.m. ET).
It comes as the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said there had been at least 35 airstrikes in and around Aleppo since a US-Russia brokered, weeklong ceasefire ended at sunset.
The army statement said the ceasefire “was a real chance to stop the bloodshed, but the armed terrorist groups flouted this agreement and failed to comply with the application of any provision of its clauses”, alleging 300 violations by rebels.
The Syrian government and its allies have mostly focused their firepower on western areas of the country that are of greatest significance to Assad, including the main cities of Damascus, Homs, Hama, Latakia, Tartous and Aleppo.
It went into effect two days later, meant to clear the way for humanitarian aid access.
Medical personnel said hospitals in the rebel-held part of Aleppo had been flooded with wounded people, including children.
The Pentagon acknowledged that it halted an airstrike by coalition planes Saturday after Russian Federation said the planes hit Syrian government forces, killing 62.
“Our hospitals are lacking essential first aid supplies”. Kerry was to hold talks on Monday night with key partners, the senior administration official said.
“The people of Syria have suffered long enough”.
One of the officials said the attack “had dealt a serious blow to our efforts” and “it is up to the Russians to demonstrate seriousness of goal”.
Once humanitarian relief arrives, the Russians and Americans are meant to agree on targeting jihadist factions: Jabhat Fateh Al-Sham, the former al Qaeda affiliate in Syria, and ISIS. To do that, they are supposed to set up a Joint Implementation Center.
“What happened today has dealt a serious blow to efforts to bring peace to Syria”, said a senior United States administration official, who added that the strike “raises very serious questions about whether the Russians can deliver their end of the arrangement” to rein in the Syrian regime.
An aid convoy has been targeted by Syrian government or Russian military aircraft, according to opposition activists. The Observatory gave a different death toll, saying 90 troops were killed in the strikes. Australia says its planes were among the global aircraft involved in the operation and has expressed condolences to the victims’ families. “The most recent example of this is the flagrant USA aggression on a Syrian Arab Army position in Deir Ezzor for the benefit of ISIS”.
A statement from US Central Command said the coalition conferred with the Russian military before the strike.
“With the rebels failing to fulfill conditions the cease-fire agreement, we consider its unilateral observance by the Syrian government forces meaningless”, Rudskoi said.
The last ceasefire, reached in February, unravelled over a period of weeks as fighting intensified, particularly in and around Aleppo, Syria’s biggest city before the war and now potentially the war’s biggest prize for pro-government forces.
Bouthaina Shaaban, a political and media adviser to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, told CNN’s Becky Anderson that Syria is adhering to the truce and the United States should start cooperating.
CNN military analyst Lt. Col. Rick Francona said Saturday the airstrike could have jeopardized the plan for Moscow and Washington to work together.
A Red Crescent warehouse was also hit and a Red Crescent health clinic was reported to be seriously damaged, he said.
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This would be the third phase of what Syrian state media says is a reconciliation agreement from December but the opposition refers to as a “starve and surrender” policy that has been in enacted in 14 areas besieged by the regime. Damascus refers to all armed opposition groups as terrorists.
