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PACT COLLAPSES IN ALEPPO:
Iranian conditions spark new wave of bloodshed in Syria
A deal to allow Syrian rebels and civilians to evacuate embattled city broke down as fighting raged on and airstrikes resumed.
BEIRUT — A deal for Syrian rebels and civilians to leave their shattered Aleppo stronghold broke down Wednesday as fresh fighting raged and evacuation buses were waved away.
The pact, brokered by Russia and Turkey, began with a cease-fire that was supposed to be followed by evacuations at dawn, ending one of the most intense and bloody battles of the more than 51⁄2-year civil war.
But by Wednesday morning, those terms seemed dead.
“The clashes are violent, and bombardment is very heavy,” said Rami Abdurrahman, director of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. “It seems as though everything is finished.”
After a monthlong offensive, government loyalists have surrounded the rebels in a tiny pinprick of territory of the strategic northern city without functioning rescue or medical operations. Hundreds of civilians have been killed — with many buried in shallow, mass graves.
On Wednesday, explosions echoed through audio recordings sent from the enclave. Airstrikes were also reported, after the skies cleared from a heavy storm that had brought respite to civilians trapped below.
And as news broke that the evacuation buses were returning to their depots, relief from the night before turned to confusion and despair.
“We want to leave ... we don’t want more massacres, let us leave, what is happening,” Yasser Hemeish, a former accountant, wrote in English in a message to journalists.
A video shared on social media showed dozens of children huddled in a basement orphanage. Contacted by phone, the director, Asmar al-Halabi, paused to let the sound of warplanes echo down the line.
“Can you hear that?” he asked. “The children are downstairs — they are terrified.”
Rebel officials and a U.N. representative contacted by Agence France-Presse said the withdrawal deal broke down after Iran — a key backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad — imposed new conditions, saying it wanted the simultaneous evacuation of wounded from two villages besieged by opposition fighters.
Despite Russian and Turkish attempts to revive the deal, there were doubts over whether Iran or the Syrian government, whose cooperation will be needed, are ready to allow rebels to leave now that they are surrounded.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin said Wednesday that they had agreed in a telephone call to push for the evacuation deal to begin.
In rejecting the Iranian demand, rebels shelled the villages Wednesday in retaliation.
According to a local doctor, pro-government forces then responded by launching mortar attacks on the beleaguered town of Madaya, where residents have starved to death.
In Aleppo, a delayed deal and a surge in fighting would deepen an already desperate crisis inside the remaining opposition-held districts.
U.N. war crimes investigators said Wednesday that the Syrian government would be responsible for preventing revenge attacks by its troops or allied forces as they swept through what remained of the rebel area.
Assad’s forces have been bolstered in Aleppo by Iranbacked Shiite militias with a record of torture and summary executions.
Rebel forces in Aleppo said Tuesday that they had launched their own “military action.”
Meanwhile, hours after the deal crumbled, the rebels said the pact was back on.
Three rebel spokesmen said the first group of wounded people and civilians were to be escorted out of the city early Thursday. Rebels would follow, they said, adding that the conditions had not changed and that they had agreed with the Russians on the number of buses and convoys to be deployed in the rescue.
The Syrian military media denied an agreement had been reached and said that the negotiations were “complicated.”
Syrian state television said shelling killed six civilians Wednesday in the Bustan al-Qasr district. Car bombs also were apparently used elsewhere.
Pressed by reporters about the U.S. response to the bloodshed, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the Obama administration continues to support humanitarian assistance and seek a negotiated end to the conflict.
With the tide of Syria’s war turned in Assad’s favor, pockets of resistance across the country have been forced — often through starvation sieges — into surrender deals that culminate in local fighters boarding buses and heading to the northern province of Idlib.
The evacuation of Aleppo’s rebel-held east would be the largest of its kind, and the biggest victory to date for Assad in a conflict that has smashed much of the country and left at least 250,000 people dead.
When rebel forces rode into Aleppo’s eastern districts in 2012, they hoped to take the whole city — Syria’s commercial hub — and turn it into a seat of power to rival Damascus, the capital. Aleppo’s loss leaves the rebels without any real bargaining chip to try to force the Assad regime into a negotiated settlement.