clear

Creating new perspectives since 2009

Rights group: Syria regime, Russia launch new attack on Idlib despite ceasefire

June 4, 2020 at 12:19 pm

People return home after the cease-fire agreement for Syria’s Idlib, along Turkey’s southern border, reached by Turkey and Russia on April 11, 2020. [Muhammed Abdullah – Anadolu Agency]

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said yesterday that the Syrian regime and Russian warplanes have launched a new offensive in northwestern Syria for the first time since a ceasefire brokered between Russia and Turkey came into effect about three months ago.

SOHR Director Rami Abdel Rahman said Russian jets targeted the Hama-Idlib-Latakia triangle; an area located on the administrative borders between the three governorates. The strikes came late on Tuesday night and early yesterday.

According to Abdel Rahman, the Russian raids came to keep opposition fighters away from the road as well as from villages in the Sahl Al-Ghab area, where the Syrian and Russian forces are deployed.

SOHR said the new attacks coincided with the new displacement of civilians from areas in Jabal Al-Zawiyah in Idlib’s southern countryside.

READ: Turkish soldier killed in Syria’s Idlib after explosion along M4 highway