The strike on the Syrian Arab Red Crescent convoy killed 20 civilians.
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The US has blamed the airstrike on the convoy, which came amid other strikes in and around Aleppo by the Syrian regime, on Syrian government or Russian forces. The top US military official told Congress on Thursday that he disagrees with Kerry’s proposal to ground all warplanes. The official wasn’t authorized to discuss the issue publicly and spoke anonymously.
The attack forced the United Nations to suspend all humanitarian convoys across Syria. He said the convoys would not go to Aleppo.
Meanwhile, a 23-lorry convoy has delivered humanitarian aid to a Damascus suburb besieged by government forces, as the United Nations resumes its aid deliveries to Syria’s opposition areas.
In response, the United Nations suspended overland aid operations to priority areas in Syria pending a full security assessment.
Unlike Kerry, who stressed the importance of Assad’s government ending military operations against rebels and allowing in unfettered aid, Lavrov said the USA had the biggest responsibility.
Syrian government aircraft were also nearby, he said.
Such attacks are not uncommon in Syria and opposition officials and rebels have been killed in similar blasts in the past.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the blast in the rebel-held village of Inkhil killed 11 people and wounded dozens.
Syrian President Bashar Assad says US airstrikes on Syrian troops in the country’s east were “definitely intentional”, lasting for an hour, and blamed the USA for the collapse of a cease-fire deal brokered with Russian Federation.
US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke testily at the meeting, denouncing the “outrageous” attack on the convoy, and saying the global community had been “woefully inadequate” in Syria, where “spoilers” had repeatedly been able to derail ceasefire efforts.
Defense Ministry spokesman Maj.
“The devastating sustained attack at our convoy at Big Urem outside Aleppo this Monday is the worst attack ever sustained on a cross-line, cross-border convoy”, Egeland said on Thursday. After suggesting that the attack was perpetrated by terrorist ground forces active in the area southwest of Aleppo, Moscow newly implied that it could have been a USA drone.
Under questioning from the Senate Armed Services Committee, Gen. Dunford revealed for the first time that both Russian and Syrian aircraft were in the area at the time of the strike.
The Syrian government has also denied that it carried out the attack.
Iraqi authorities hope the course of the battle will allow most residents to shelter in place to avoid creating a humanitarian crisis as forces move towards Mosul, where more than a million people are still living.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry wants all aircraft over key humanitarian routes in northern Syria grounded in order to facilitate desperately need aid deliveries. -Russian military partnership against the Islamic State and al-Qaida.
The Soviet-built Admiral Kuznetsov, the only aircraft carrier in the Russian navy, has recently been re-equipped with new fighter jets.
Intense air raids shook Aleppo in Syria yesterday as increasing tensions between Moscow and Washington poisoned efforts to revive a failed ceasefire. “The United States continues to believe there is a way forward that, although rocky and hard and uncertain, can provide the most viable path out of the carnage”, Kerry said.
Assad, in the interview conducted Wednesday, said the U.S.
Gabriel urged the Russian leader to use his influence on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to bring about a de-escalation in Syria.
Four medics were killed and a nurse critically wounded when an air strike hit a clinic in a village near Aleppo late on Tuesday.
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A strike on a Syrian Red Crescent aid convoy earlier this week prompted worldwide condemnation.
