Aleppo, once Syria’s most populated city, now holds 300,000 people, including approximately 100,000 children.
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Lieutenant-General Sergei Chvarkov was cited by Russia’s TASS news agency as saying that the Nureddin al-Zenki rebel group on Tuesday launched weapons packed with an unnamed “poisonous agent” from an opposition-held neighbourhood to a government-controlled area of Aleppo.
“They are the most risky”.
Terrorists are trying to prevent the population from fleeing the eastern part of civilians-8937/”>the city of Aleppo the best they can, threatening to shoot civilians or publicly execute them.
Rebels and their jihadists allies launched an assault Sunday in a bid to ease a more than two-week government siege of opposition-held districts of the city.
Once Syria’s economic powerhouse, Aleppo has been ravaged by the war that began in March 2011 with anti-government protests.
When Western nations balk at the notion of aiding the Syrian people, whether by supporting a meaningful regime change in Syria or by granting civilians refuge, they like to point to the worst examples of the product of war, including violent retaliation-but when they do that, they completely forget there are still children, like these in Aleppo, fighting for their lives.
The Syrian authorities in cooperation with the Russians also opened three safe passages for civilians wishing to leave eastern Aleppo.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based opposition monitor, said there were at least 40 air strikes on opposition areas, including on a camp for displaced people in Atareb, south-west of Aleppo. “All airstrikes today targeted residential areas”, he said. It said all six facilities hit between July 23 and July 31 were major hospitals in Aleppo governorate, including a referral hospital just outside opposition-held eastern Aleppo and a pediatric clinic inside the city where four infants died after their oxygen supply was cut.
Aleppo, Syria’s biggest city before the outbreak of the conflict five years ago, has been divided between government forces and rebels since the summer of 2012.
“The prices for goods are skyrocketing”, he said, adding that the cost of a liter of gasoline had increased sixfold, “that is if you can find it”.
“People are slightly hopeful that the battles on the west side will end up helping lift the siege, so they can regain access to food and medicine”, he said.
There is “fighting in too many places, and that affects the besieged towns more than anything else”, he said.
Rebel advances in Aleppo earlier were subsequently overshadowed by government progress on the battlefield bolstered by Russian airstrikes, leading to the seizure of several hilltops and villages.
“If this doesn’t happen, it will be a black stain on the conscience of humanity”, he said.
“Everyone who went there found out that they are very unsafe for crossing”.
“True, there are ongoing bombings, but at least we are in our lands”.
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Jan Egeland, an adviser to the UN’s special envoy to Syria, said on Thursday that there were 44 attacks on hospitals, clinics and health posts around Syria in July alone. He also proposed 48-hour “humanitarian pauses” in the fighting to allow cross-border operations.
