Biplanes complete rally’s last leg
STELLENBOSCH: Brave aviators taking part in a vintage air rally have finally ended their 8,000-mile adventure. Nearly a dozen biplanes, many of them built in the 1920s, flew the final leg of the VintageAir Rally along the South African coast and landed in the vineyard town of Stellenbosch. The event started in Crete on November 12, with pilots from South Africa, Botswana and elsewhere raising money for charity. THE evacuation of civilians and opposition fighters from eastern Aleppo has been suspended but there were conflicting accounts of why it was halted.
Russia says that all women and children have been taken out of eastern Aleppo and that a final sweep by the Syrian military is under way to clear out the last remaining rebels in the city.
A statement from the Russian military’s Centre for Reconciliation in Syria said the evacuations have been “completed”.
It came shortly after the Syrian government said it was suspending the evacuations because a convoy leaving Aleppo was fired on by the rebels. However, the UN and international aid agencies insist there are still people in eastern Aleppo waiting to be evacuated.
Russia said that more than 9,500 people, including more than 4,500 rebels and 337 wounded, have been taken out of the rebel-held districts in eastern Aleppo.
The Russian military also says some diehard militants have stayed behind and are firing on the Syrian government troops.
The UN health agency’s top official in Syria says negotiations are under way in hopes of resuming evacuations from rebel-held parts of eastern Aleppo. Elizabeth Hoff, the Syria representative for the World Health Organisation, says that the agency knows “there are a large number of women and children, and there are others, who are still inside and want to get out”.
She spoke by phone from government-controlled western Aleppo, after Russia’s military claimed all women and children had been taken out of eastern Aleppo during evacuations that began a day earlier involving WHO help.
Ms Hoff says “negotiations are ongoing” through the office of the UN envoy for Syria to try to restart the evacuations. She says she has no indication the evacuations have been completed.
Earlier, Syrian state TV claimed the evacuation was suspended after rebels opened fire on a convoy at one of the crossing points of the rebel-held enclave.
Ikhbariya TV also claimed the rebels tried to take with them captives they had seized and were holding in the rebel enclave.
Lebanon’s Al-Manar Hezbollah TV said the Syrian army stopped the process because the rebels had violated the ceasefire deal. Hezbollah militiamen are fighting in the Syrian civil war alongside President Bashar Assad’s forces.
Lebanon-based Al-Mayadeen TV said buses that were parked at the Ramouseh crossing point in southern Aleppo had left the area after it was targeted by gunmen.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin said he and his Turkish counterpart are working to launch a new round of peace talks between the Syrian government and the opposition – negotiations which would take place in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana.
Mr Putin, speaking during a visit to Japan, said Ankara had helped to broker the rebel exit from Aleppo that is currently under way. He said he and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are also working for an overall truce in Syria.
The Russian leader said that once the Syrian army secures control of all of Aleppo, civilians will be able to return to their homes.