Units of the army and armed forces in cooperation with the allied forces on Thursday continued to advance in the southern countryside of Aleppo central province, establishing control on a number of positions in the area surrounding the military academies and 1070 Apartments Project.
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UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura said: “We are available and interested in talking to ensure that the three hours could not be simply as a declaration and then nothing happens”. Amnesty researcher Diana Semaan told AP Television that a doctor received 60 people who had been exposed in the alleged attack.
Men, women and children are shown being fitted with oxygen masks by medical staff.
Hospital workers react after a barrel bomb struck just outside the Omar bin Abdaziz hospital in the Maadi district of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo following government air raids on rebel-held districts of the city on July 16.
United Nations special envoy Staffan de Mistura confirmed the global body’s experts were investigating reports of a gas, believed to be chlorine, being dropped on Aleppo.
“There is a lot of evidence that it actually did take place”, he told reporters. “If it did take place, it is a war crime”.
Hamza Khatib, manager of the local Al Quds hospital, said it recorded four deaths related to gas poisoning and another 55 injuries, Reuters reported.
“The smell was very strong – beyond any description”.
“There were people who had already been displaced sheltering in nearby areas, they had to leave”, the 61-year-old agricultural engineer said via telephone.
“When we examined these casualties, we realised it was due to chlorine”, he added.
Chlorine, a common household substance, is not a banned substance under the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons treaty.
Four people are dead after a suspected “chlorine bomb” was dropped on innocent civilians in Aleppo, Syria.
It was not clear who was responsible.
Another injured witness added: “Something like a barrel hit where we were staying”.
“Because without us even more of our friends and neighbors will die”.
Fighting has escalated in Aleppo in recent days, with rebels severing the government’s main route to the west of the city.
It has been pretty much under siege since the middle of last month – surrounded by government forces.
Grim details of the suspected gas attack emerged as the United Nations called on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his Russian allies to respect a 48-hour ceasefire.
About Russia’s proposal for daily three-hour ceasefires in Aleppo, de Mistura said such short-scale truces were not enough.
Andre Perache, head of programs at Doctors Without Borders in the United Kingdom and a former head of mission for Syria, said that lack of vital hospital supplies such as antibiotics and fuel to run generators forces doctors in Syria to make hard decisions.
Fifteen of the only remaining doctors in the eastern half implored US President Barack Obama on Thursday to protect civilians from atrocities in their city.
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The doctors say there is an attack on a medical facility every 17 hours, meaning services in the area could be annihilated within one month if no action is taken soon.
