Dozens killed in Idlib offensive
beirut — Dozens of fighters and civilians were killed in Syria’s Idlib province as the government pressed a deadly offensive on Thursday towards a key town in the country’s last rebel bastion.
The latest violence, which followed air strikes that killed 18 civilians on Wednesday, buried a ceasefire deal announced by Russia and rebel backer Turkey that never really took hold.
“Clashes broke out around midnight on Wednesday south of the city of Maaret Al Numan, together with heavy bombardment despite the Russian-Turkish truce,” Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said. According to the war monitor, the fighting raged in areas south of Maaret Al Numan, the key target of the Syrian government’s latest military offensive.
At least 22 anti-government fighters were killed, most of them members of Hayat Tahrir Al Sham, a group that includes fighters from the former Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. Seventeen government troops and allied militia were also killed in the fighting, the Observatory said. Abdel Rahman added that government forces were now just seven kilometres from Maaret Al Numan.
Nearly nine years into the conflict, protests against the government are still held in some of the province’s towns.
In the city of Idlib itself, 18 civilians were killed and several others wounded in Russian and Syrian air strikes on Wednesday, the Observatory said.
Reporters saw scenes of chaos after the strikes, that blew several buildings in an industrial zone to smithereens.
The bombardment engulfed several vehicles, leaving torched corpses of motorists trapped inside. —