Airstrikes kill at least 80 civilians in Syria

Government says it controls 70 per cent of rebel-held Ghouta; rebels recapture town from Syrian army

BEIRUT — At least 80 civilians were killed in Syria in airstrikes by government jets and allied Russians on the besieged rebel enclave of eastern Ghouta, a monitoring group said.

The deadliest strikes on Friday were mounted by Russian jets in the enclave’s town of Kafr Batna, leaving at least 46 civilians dead, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights added.

“This is another massacre and the world is still silent,” Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Britain-based Observatory, told news service dpa.

Russia is a major ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Its 2015 intervention in the war-torn country has tilted the balance in favour of Assad. The U.N. Security Council again demanded a ceasefire throughout Syria and backed a U.N.-endorsed road map for a peaceful transition and elections in the conflict-torn country.

The council expressed its “deepest concerns” and joined de Mistura in condemning the perpetrators of violence in Damascus and the rebel-held suburbs of eastern Ghouta in violation of the Feb. 24 ceasefire resolution. Abdel Rahman said earlier Friday that the planes carrying out the airstrikes had used thermite bombs, which caused major fires and resulted in burns for the victims in eastern Ghouta, the target of a month-long government operation. The Observatory reported that government forces Friday seized most of Eastern Ghouta’s town of Jisrine in a further advance into the enclave. Eastern Ghouta, located on the outskirts of the capital, Damascus, has been one of the few remaining areas in Syria under rebel control. But the rebels have been losing ground since the government began its latest offensive against the area in midFebruary. The Syrian army on Friday claimed to have retaken control of around 70 per cent of the enclave from the rebels.

Abu Ahed put the death toll at 50, including 10 who had been burned beyond recognition. “We could see flames throughout the market and people who caught fire ,” the activist said via a WhatsApp call. The strikes came after Syrian rebels gained ground they had lost a day before in Eastern Ghouta. Rebels from Faylaq al-Rahman launched a counterattack on government forces in the rebelheld region near Damascus overnight and captured most of the territory they had lost in eastern Ghouta’s southern town of Hamouriyeh, Abdel Rahman said.