Airstrikes kill 23: activists

SNC denounces massacre in Deir al-Asafir

This undated photo provided by The Day After Heritage Initiative, shows the courtyard of the Maarat al-Numan Mosaics Museum before government shelling hit it in June 2015, in Idlib province, Syria. The roof area also sustained prior damage during the fighting in 2011 and 2012 when the city changed hands from regime to opposition. Faced with the Islamic State group onslaught, Syrian antiquities authorities succeeded in evacuating hundreds of thousands of artifacts to safety from museums around the country in recent years, while in opposition-held areas like Maarat al-Numan, experts tried to protect what they

could. (AP) BEIRUT, March 31, (AP): Airstrikes hit near a school and a hospital east of the Syrian capital of Damascus on Wednesday, killing at least 23 people in one of the deadliest incidents since a partial ceasefire came into effect in the war-torn country more than a month ago, pro-opposition activists said Thursday.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the casualties were caused by a series of airstrikes that struck the rebel-held town of Deir al-Asafir, which lies east of Damascus in an area known as Eastern Ghouta. Four children and a civil defense worker were among the victims, the Observatory said. The Local Coordination Committees, another opposition activist group, put the death toll from the airstrikes at 17.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the airstrikes.

The government says al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria, the Nusra Front, operates in the eastern suburbs of Damascus. The militant group and its rival, the Islamic State group, are both excluded from a cease-fire that has been in place in Syria for a month.

The Western-backed Syrian opposition says the government of President Bashar Assad has been targeting civilians despite the truce.

The Syrian National Coalition, an opposition group, denounced the “massacre” in Deir al-Asafir, saying it threatened to derail the cease-fire and peace talks that are scheduled to resume in Geneva in two weeks.

“This crime is the latest in a series of actions that aim to consecrate ongoing violations of the cease-fire,” the SNC said in a statement.

The Observatory says around 2,700 families live in Deir al-Asafir. Government troops have been trying to encircle the town for weeks. There was no immediate reaction from the Syrian government, which rarely comments on security issues.

The talks in Geneva are meant to start a political process for transition in Syria away from Assad. In comments made in an interview with Russia’s state news agency Sputnik, however, Assad rejected a key opposition demand for a transitional ruling body with full powers, which major powers agreed on at a Geneva conference in June 2012. He proposed instead a national unity government that comprises government loyalists and members of the opposition.