International News

BEIRUT, (MILLAT+APP/AFP) – Syrian government forces
have recaptured all of the areas taken by rebel fighters in
a recent assault intended to break the regime siege on eastern
Aleppo, a monitor said Saturday.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the army
had recaptured key areas including the western district of
Dahiyet al-Assad and the village of Minyan outside the city.
The reversals undo all of the progress made during a
recent push by opposition fighters, including former Al-Qaeda
affiliate Fateh al-Sham front, as they tried to end a
government siege on eastern Aleppo city.
Government forces surrounded rebel-held east Aleppo
in July, severing the last supply line into opposition
neighbourhoods and imposing a blockade that has led to
food and fuel shortages.
Rebels have tried several times to break the siege,
succeeding briefly in August, but no aid has entered the
east since July.
The monitor said over 450 fighters and civilians had
been killed since the rebels began their latest bid to break
the siege on October 28.
The dead include 215 Syrian and foreign opposition
fighters, including some who carried out suicide bomb
attacks, and 143 regime forces.
Nearly 100 civilians were also killed in the fighting,
the majority of them in government-held west Aleppo, where
29 children were among those killed in waves of rebel
rocket fire.