Thousands escape the sieges as the Syria evacuation deals resume
Exchange between regime and rebel territories goes on
BEIRUT // The last rebels in the town of Zabadani near Damascus have either departed for rebel-held regions or accepted government rule, pro-government Syrian media reported yesterday.
Thousands of people also left Al Foua and Kefraya, two Shiite villages under rebel siege, after a reciprocal evacuation deal resumed days after a suicide bombing killed 126 people waiting to be allowed to proceed.
“The area of Zabadani is empty of militants after the last batch of them left this morning,” the pro-government Sham FM radio reported, citing a senior official in Zabadani. About 45 buses carrying 3,000 people left Al Foua and Kefraya near Idlib for government-controlled Aleppo, while a convoy of 11 buses left Zabadani, which is under Syrian army siege.
But as the complex evacuation was being negotiated in Rashidin, a south-western suburb of Aleppo, a bomb exploded in the nearby Salaheddin neighbourhood, killing six people and injuring more than 30.
Syrian state television reported the explosion but did not specify whether it was the result of an attack or unexploded ordnance left over from the four and a half years of fighting that preceded the rebel pullout from Aleppo. Salaheddin was once on the front line between rebels and government forces. Two of the 32 wounded were in intensive care in Aleppo University hospital, said Hashim Shalash, head of Aleppo’s forensic medicine unit. However, he could not confirm the death toll.
‘ The area of Zabadani is empty of militants after the last batch of them left this morning Pro-government Sham FM radio
Eyewitnesses said they heard a blast during a funeral procession for a member of a pro-government militia in Aleppo.
On Saturday, a bomb attack on a convoy from Al Foua and Kefraya killed 126 people, including more than 60 children, who were travelling by bus under an agreement between rebels and government forces. Civilians and pro-government fighters from the Shiite villages were travelling by bus to government-controlled Aleppo, while insurgents and families from Al-Zabadani and Madaya near Damascus crossed to rebel-held territory, having first gone to Aleppo.
Three buses yesterday also carried wounded people from Saturday’s convoy attack, as well as the remains of those who had died, the Hizbollah military media unit reported.