The U.N.’s special envoy to Syria, Staffan de Mistura, warned on Friday that basic supplies in eastern Aleppo could run out in three weeks. De Mistura is struggling to restart peace talks among the warring parties in Syria, even as the Syria war has increasingly been handled by diplomacy between the US and Russian Federation.
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United Nations deputy spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters in NY that the U.N.is aware of Monday’s crash of a Russian helicopter in rebel-held territory and reports that it was on an operation to deliver aid.
The government completely closed the main road into rebel-held areas of Aleppo on July 17, effectively besieging the 300,000 people living there.
Shells fired by Syrian rebel groups killed at least 28 civilians in southwestern districts of the battleground city of Aleppo over the last 24 hours, a monitor said.
Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, yesterday said those killed “included six children and eight women” in two government-controlled neighbourhoods of divided Aleppo. He said that 82 militants also have put down weapons.
Videos uploaded online by Syrian opposition activists show the burning wreckage of a Russian helicopter downed in Syria.
The Mi-8 transporter was brought down by rebels, Russian Federation says, in northern Idlib province.
All five were killed, Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, told reporters on Monday.
In one video, a rocket pod can be seen next to the wreckage. The helicopter appears to have broken up as it crashed, its tail can be seen lying separately from the aircraft’s body in flames. It has brought the official Russian casualty toll to 19, 16 of whom were killed in enemy fire.
He says the Russians “died heroically because they tried to move the aircraft away so to minimize losses on the ground”.
A Russian military helicopter carrying five people has been shot down in the north of Syria’s rebel-held Idlib province, the Russian defence ministry said.
The helicopter had three crew members and two officers from the Russian reconciliation center.
Idlib is held nearly entirely by a powerful coalition of hardline rebel groups, including the former al-Nusra Front, now known as the Fateh al-Sham group after renouncing its status as al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate.
A Russian marine sent on a mission to rescue the pilot was also killed when his helicopter was shot down.
The helicopter shot down on Sunday in the rebel-held Idlib province had three crew members and two officers on board.
It was the third Russian helicopter lost in action in Syria this year.
The development came a day after Syrian rebels launched the offensive to break up the government’s siege of the eastern, rebel-held part of the city.
Opposition activists said intense fighting was still ongoing in Aleppo on Monday.
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The Syrian and Russian militaries have secured safe corridors for residents who want to flee the besieged city, but as of Saturday only a few people had left. He did not elaborate.
