The Syrian army said it would abide by the cease-fire until midnight on Sunday, while maintaining its right to defend itself against any violations.
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While much of Syria has remained calm for the past 24 hours, a powerful al-Qaida-linked group has sharply criticized the U.S. -Russian-brokered cease-fire, saying its real aim was to keep Assad in power.
But a number of rebel groups have been fighting side by side with Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, raising concerns among opposition members that other factions will be targeted as well. The conflict has killed more than 290,000 people since its beginning in 2011 while displacing half of the country’s population.
Turkey had said it aimed, with the United Nations, to send trucks of food, children’s clothes and toys to the northern Syrian city of Aleppo after the truce took effect late on Monday.
What happens if it holds: The first week of the truce will be crucial.
It also marks the biggest bet yet by the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama that it can work with Russian Federation to end a war that President Vladimir Putin transformed a year ago when he sent warplanes to join the fight on Assad’s side.
What the combatants can do: Mr.al-Assad’s forces can continue air strikes against Islamic State and al-Qaeda-linked militants.
-Starting Monday, the USA and Russian Federation should have started developing actionable targets against the Islamic State and al-Qaida-linked militants, so that strikes can start immediately after the center is established.
A Syrian military source meanwhile said armed groups in Aleppo had sniped on residential buildings, and fired three mortar bombs at a government-held area on the city outskirts.
Syrian troops, allied militias and civilian areas came under shelling 23 times since the truce took effect on Monday, mostly from areas where US -backed rebels are based, Russian Lt.
“Today calm appears to have prevailed across Hama, Latakia, Aleppo city and Rural Aleppo and Idlib, with only some allegations of sporadic and geographically isolated incidents”, de Mistura told reporters in Geneva.
There were also disagreements about planned aid deliveries into the city, with the council for rebel-held districts of Aleppo rejecting any Russian or Syrian regime deployment on the main road to be used for deliveries.
The rebel-held part of Aleppo and two villages outside the city came under shelling on Tuesday from government forces, without causing any casualties, according to the United Kingdom -based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees reported some shelling in Aleppo and the southern region of Quneitra. Mr.al-Assad’s forces are no longer supposed to bomb Syria’s opposition.
In Geneva, the United Nations humanitarian aid coordinator said on Tuesday that no deliveries had been made since the cease-fire went into effect, despite the agency’s own assessment that more than 13 million people in Syria are in need of some sort of aid.
Hours after it took effect, a group of militant outfits, including the so-called Free Syrian Army and its affiliated groups, including Ahrar al-Sham and Jaish al-Islam, released a joint statement bashing the accord and calling it “unjust”.
“We strongly call on all those who have influence on these cease-fire violators, first and foremost the American side, to finally deal with their clients”, Russia’s Foreign Ministry later said.
A nationwide ceasefire was holding across Syria at the start of its second day on Tuesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
It said on Tuesday that the dead include 59,000 government troops and more than 86,000 civilians.
In a letter to the United States on Sunday, Free Syrian Army rebel groups wrote, “We in the revolutionary factions reconfirm our fixed position of dealing positively with the idea of a ceasefire”.
The group says the real death toll could be 70,000 higher since many insurgent groups don’t announce their deaths and because there are other deaths that are not documented.
Some 400,000 to 500,000 people have died so far in Syria’s five-year-old civil war, according to the most recent estimates.
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But there is still deep scepticism about whether the truce will last, with the opposition yet to officially sign on. It denied a Syrian claim that a warplane and drone were shot down.
