Regime forces win rebel area of Aleppo

Syrian government tightens grip on city as troops seize suburb, and barrel bombs and shells pound opposition districts

BEIRUT // Syrian government forces seized a rebel-held area on the north-west outskirts of Aleppo yesterday, tightening their siege of opposition-controlled parts of the city, a monitor said.

The government also renewed barrel bomb attacks on an opposition-held district, a day after bombardments that killed at least 24 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The Britain-based group said loyalist troops had full control of the Leramun district after fierce fighting, and reported clashes in the neighbouring district of Bani Zeid, which is also held by rebels.

The two areas have been used by rebels to launch rockets into government- held districts in the west of the city.

Aleppo city has been divided between government control in the west and rebel control in the east since mid-2012. In recent weeks, regime advances around the city’s outskirts severed the only remaining route into the rebel- held eastern neighbourhoods, effectively placing them under siege.

Opposition forces responded with a barrages of missiles into government districts, killing scores of civilians.

“The importance of capturing Leramun and Bani Zeid is to stop the missile fire and also to further tighten the siege,” said Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman. He said government forces had surrounded Bani Zeid, reporting sustained air strikes in the area. The country’s state news agency, Sana, carried a call from the military urging residents of eastern Aleppo to “join the national reconciliation and expel the foreign mercenaries” from their neighbourhoods.

The agency said the army had sent text messages to residents and fighters in the east identifying “safe passages” for civilians wishing to leave and urging rebels to lay down their weapons.

Government forces also continued to shell opposition areas of the city, with the Observatory reporting a new barrel bomb attack yesterday on the district of Al Mashhad.

It said at least one child was killed and the toll was expected to rise because many people were still missing beneath the rubble.

Meanwhile, US secretary of state John Kerry said yesterday that fresh talks with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov were “making progress” and that he hoped next month to announce new steps aimed at ending the fighting. Moscow and Washington co-chair a 22-member contact group working to end the war but a truce brokered by them in February faltered amid renewed fighting.

“If we do our work as effectively as it’s been done over the last days since I was in Moscow, my hope would be that somewhere in early August we would be in a position to be able to stand up in front of you and tell you what we’re able to do,” said Mr Kerry, referring to marathon talks he held with Russian president Vladimir Putin and Mr Lavrov in Moscow last week.

“In simple terms, what we’re trying to do is strengthen the cessation of hostilities, provide a framework that allows us to actually get to the table and have a real negotiation.”

At last week’s talks in Moscow, the countries agreed on “concrete steps” to revive the ceasefire and tackle extremist groups in Syria.

Mr Lavrov, meanwhile, yesterday said that recent discussions between Russia and the US should encourage moderate Syrian opposition groups to leave areas held by Al Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Al Nusra to help implement a truce. Moscow and Washington have differed over the role of Al Nusra, with Russia calling the group terrorists and the US asking Russia not to target them for fear of hitting the moderate opposition.

Al Nusra is engaged in a variety of local alliances with other rebel groups that the US and its Arab allies do not want targeted during the faltering ceasefire, which excludes extremists. Al Nusra’s fighters are often embedded with such groups on the battlefield or move between various militant formations.

The dispute over Al Nusra has undermined the Russian and US-brokered truce with fighting continuing to rage in many areas in Syria.

What we are trying to do is strengthen the cessation of hostilities John Kerry US secretary of state