Warplane attacks kill 10 in Syria

WARPLANES struck a town in a rebelheld enclave in north-western Syria, killing at least 10 people, including some whom were fleeing the attack, opposition activists and a rescue service said yesterday. The attack, believed to have been carried out by Russian warplanes backing a Syrian government offensive, also put a local hospital out of service, they said. The late Wednesday night assault on Ariha, a town in Idlib province, comes as the rebel-held enclave is under intense fire amid Syrian government advances in the area, which had been controlled by the opposition for nearly eight years. The Russian Defence Ministry rejected claims it was behind the attack, calling them a “provocation”. The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the death toll from the airstrikes was at least 10 civilians. The rescue Syrian Civil Defence, known as the White Helmets, said 11 people, including a child, were killed when the Russian warplanes hit a road used by displaced people trying to leave Ariha. Both the Observatory and the White Helmets said a local hospital and a bakery were struck. At least 24 people were wounded, including a doctor, a White Helmet volunteer, three women and two children, the rescuers said. An Associated Press video shows the damaged hospital in a residential area, with medical equipment broken, supplies strewn over the floor and windows and doors dislodged from their frames. At least six people, relatives of patients, were killed as they waited outside the hospital, said Zuheir Qarat, a surgeon. An anaesthesiologist was critically wounded, Qarat said, and remained at the hospital for over an hour until rescuers were able to evacuate him after the raids ended, along with 15 patients. Hospital generators and one hospital car were burned, he added. No patients were hurt. Qarat described the three raids before midnight, that occurred within minutes of each other. “It destroyed the hospital and put it out of service,” Qarat told the AP in a voice message from Ariha. “There were also people injured from neighboring buildings.” The raids sparked several fires in residential apartments, said a rescuer, who gave only his nickname, Abdel-Karim, because of concerns for his safety. He added that his team of volunteers were going through the area to ensure no survivors remained buried under the rubble. Qarat said “striking the hospital is a message... a warning to evacuate,” adding that Ariha residents started fleeing after the raids. The UN humanitarian affairs and emergency relief co-ordinator Mark Lowcock described to the Security Council on Wednesday the dire conditions in the rebel-held areas. At least 20 000 people were displaced in the last two days, he said, adding that 115000 left their homes in the past week – bringing the total of those uprooted by the violence since last month to 390000. “Many families are moving multiple times. They arrive in a place thought to be safe, only for the bombs to follow, so they are forced to move again,” he said. “This cycle is all too familiar in north-west Syria.” In the Russian-backed offensive, Syrian troops captured Maaret al-Numan, one of the largest and most strategic rebel-held towns in Idlib province on Wednesday. The town, which had been in rebel hands since 2012, sits on the highway linking Damascus with Aleppo and is considered critical to President Bashar Assad’s forces.