Syrian regime raids on Aleppo kill 16 civilians

Dozens of Syrian regime strikes on Aleppo killed at least 16 civilians on Sunday, a monitor said, and caused huge damage to one fighter-held district targeted by a barrel bomb.

The crude, unguided explosive device hit the Qaterji neighborhood, where an AFP photographer saw a street strewn with rubble as residents ran for safety and a rescuer rushed a bloodied child into an ambulance.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said nine civilians were killed in Qaterji and two others, including a child, were killed in the Mayssar neighborhood of the northern city.
Another five civilians were killed in two other districts and on the city’s outskirts.
In Qaterji a man stood in the middle of a road surrounded by debris and shouting angrily: “There are only civilians here, there are no rebels!“
Further down the street two women and two children scrambled for safety past the mangled iron shutters of shops and buildings badly damaged by the barrel bomb, the AFP photographer said.
The rescuer, his hair covered in white dust, carried a child with a blood-covered face to an ambulance in which another wounded child already lay. A truce agreed by Russia and the United States in February has been violated nearly continuously around Aleppo, where the regime and fighter groups have fought for control since 2012.
Around 200,000 people lived in eastern parts of Aleppo held by the fighters and the only route out of those areas has been cut following fierce fighting that erupted on Thursday.
More than 300 civilians have been killed in Aleppo since April.
The UN wants Damascus to allow airdrops of food and medicine to civilians trapped in besieged areas which aid convoys cannot reach.
The planes sending the aid need to be able to fly in a secure airspace, either with the agreement of warring parties, or by flying at very high altitude to escape missile fire.
At least 280,000 people have been killed and millions displaced since Syria’s war started in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.

Source : Arab News