There was no letup in fighting between Syrian allied forces backed by Russian Federation airstrikes and rebels in Aleppo on Thursday, a day after reports of a chlorine attack on rebel positions.
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Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations envoy for Syria, said Thursday that if the chorine gas attack took place it would constitute a “war crime”.
A reporter for the Beirut-based Pan Arab Al-Mayadeen TV, Rida al-Basha, who is on the government side of Aleppo, said the Syrian army regained control of two of the three villages it lost near Aleppo earlier this week.
Accusations involving use of chlorine and other poisonous gases are not uncommon in Syria’s civil war, and both sides have denied using them while blaming the other for using them as a weapon of war. Western powers say the government has been responsible for chlorine and otherchemical attacks.
Khaled Harah, a first responder, said a government helicopter dropped four barrel bombs on Wednesday night on the neighborhood of Zabadieh and that one of them released chlorine gas.
Fifteen of the last remaining doctors in rebel-controlled areas of the war-torn Syrian city of Aleppo challenged President Barack Obama on Thursday to intervene and “prove that you are the friend of Syrians”.
The rebel advance which broke through the siege on Saturday has not yet secured a safe enough passage to make more than one food delivery to the east, or for civilians to move through, with government bombardments hitting that rebel corridor on the city’s southwestern outskirts.
Those killed in air strikes also included civilians. “The support we are able to provide is a drop in the ocean”, he said. In the last month in Syria, it said, there have been 42 attacks on hospitals and clinics.
Last week, pro-government news agencies said rebels had launched rockets with chlorine at government districts in Aleppo, while opposition activists reported a poison gas attack in northwestern Idlib.
The plea for help came as the Russians said they would suspend their air campaign over Aleppo for three hours each day to allow humanitarian aid to be delivered.
Fighting has escalated in Aleppo in recent weeks, with the Russian-backed Assad regime engaged in an intense stand-off with rebels.
Hamza Khatib, manager of Al Quds hospital, told Reuters that he had recorded four deaths and 55 injuries. The Chemical Weapons Convention prohibits the development, production, stockpiling, transfer and use of chemical weapons and requires States Parties to destroy chemical weapon stockpiles.
“Turkish government will soon cut off supplies to the Syrian opposition groups after boosting ties with Russian Federation, in preparation for a political solution”, YPG official Meer Abass told ARA News.
But the Red Crescent brought diesel to a pumping station and as a result water was restored to some areas in east and west Aleppo after six days.
This killed an estimated 1,429 people, including at least 426 children.
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Though it is unclear if Russia’s military participated in Thursday’s attacks amid a proposed three-hour cease-fire, the Syrian regime did not participate in the halt to hostilities, according to local sources, BBC News reported.
