Syria evacuation resumes after bus bombing

The evacuation of thousands of Syrians from besieged areas resumed today, days after an attack on a convoy carrying evacuees killed over a hundred people, many of them children.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed that “since dawn today the second part of the first phase of the demographic change agreement was continued”.

About 45 buses carrying 3,000 people left Foua and Kefraya near Idlib for government-controlled Aleppo, while a convoy of 11 buses left army-besieged Al-Zabadani.

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The evacuation took place under a deal struck in March for the transfer of 16,000 people from the Shia-majority town of Foua and Kefraya in exchange for the evacuation of opposition forces and their families from Al-Zabadani and Madaya towns in Damascus.

The evacuation was halted last Saturday following an attack which killed 126 people, including at least 68 children, when a powerful bomb explosion struck near several buses carrying evacuees as they waited to enter Aleppo.

It was also reported that three buses also carried wounded people from Saturday’s convoy attack, as well as the remains of those who had died.