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No flight allowed to leave Syria, US secretary of state Kerry says

Russian Federation decided that aid to the enemies of the regime it is trying to prop up in Syria should not be allowed to reach its destination, so it destroyed the aid convoy. Syrians living in opposition areas will be disproportionately affected because the U.N.’s major warehouses are located in government-held areas.

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The United States and Russian Federation blamed each other for Syria’s failing cease-fire Wednesday, illustrating why a fractured U.N. Security Council has been unable for more than five years to do anything to stop the Arab country’s civil war.

Mr Kerry told the UN Security Council on Wednesday that such a step could restore credibility to efforts to end the five-year civil war and “give a chance for humanitarian assistance to flow unimpeded”. Islamic State militants used the chaos to seize territory.

The US believes that Russian Federation was responsible for an air strike on an aid convoy that killed about 20 people in Syria, a US official told AFP on Tuesday.

An air strike hit relief trucks near the city of Aleppo on Monday, shattering a ceasefire.

“I emphasize this to Russian Federation”.

A US State Department statement said: “We don’t know at this point whether it was the Russians or the regime”.

After halting aid operations in response to the convoy attack, the United Nations said it was ready to resume humanitarian deliveries. The convoy was carrying aid materials from the United Nations.

“I call on every country to cease providing support of any kind to any party that is trying to sabotage this plan”, Kerry said.

Moscow backs Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government, while Washington supports numerous rebel factions fighting to topple him.

Only the Islamic State group and the Al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front are not covered by the ceasefire, but Russian Federation has long argued that other groups are fighting alongside those jihadists.

Mr Kerry said the strike – which killed about 20 civilians and destroyed 18 aid lorries – raised “profound doubt” about whether Russian Federation and its Syrian ally were committed to upholding a ceasefire.

Nusra is still characterized by both the West and Moscow as a terrorist group excluded from the ceasefire.

Earlier Russia, which denied its aircraft or those of its Syrian government allies were involved, had said it believed the convoy was not struck from the air at all but had caught fire because of some incident on the ground. Washington said that strike was carried out by mistake with the intent of hitting Islamic State militants.

It leaves the USA military sitting and waiting on word from the State Department and the United Nations that the cease-fire has either officially been terminated or that the Syrian and Russian militaries have taken the appropriate steps to move forward with the deal initially struck. She was referring to the rebel-besieged towns of Foua and Kefraya in Idlib and government-blockaded Madaya and Zabadani near the Lebanese border.

As far as the United States is concerned, Russian Federation was responsible for the bombing of a humanitarian aid convoy near Aleppo that killed about 20 civilians and has outraged the world. SARC has continued deliveries to other areas of Syria, officials say.

The Russian also cited a series of truce violations by US -backed rebel groups near the northern city of Aleppo. “We will certainly target all these gatherings and mobilizations they are conducting”.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the strike.

The U.S. office of UOSSM said two nurses and two ambulance drivers were killed and one nurse remained in a critical condition following the attack on the medical facility in Khan Touman.

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The Paris-based Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations (UOSSM) said the strike appeared to be targeted.

Air strikes set Aleppo ablaze ahead of talks to salvage a truce in Syria