GHOUTA: The largest convoy yet of Eastern Ghouta evacuees arrived in northwestern Syria Tuesday and the regime threatened to resume its blitz if the last holdout rebels don’t follow suit. Government troops, backed by Russia and loyalist militia, launched a ferocious assault more than a month ago to retake the enclave on the outskirts of […]
Ghouta
Air strikes on Syria’s Ghouta kill 30 civilians: monitor
GHOUTA: Air strikes on Eastern Ghouta killed at least 30 civilians on Saturday, a monitor said, almost a month into a blistering Russia-backed regime assault on the Syrian rebel enclave outside Damascus. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights could not say who carried out the strikes on the town of Zamalka in a southern […]
Aid convoy enters Syria’s battered Ghouta: Red Cross
GHOUTA: An aid convoy entered Syria’s battered Eastern Ghouta on Friday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said, after a previous delivery was cut short by bombardment of the rebel enclave. “They are in,” ICRC spokeswoman Ingy Sedky said of the 13 trucks loaded with 2,400 food parcels that had been waiting outside the […]
Aid convoy enters Syria enclave as regime presses offensive
DAMASCUS: A UN convoy entered Syria’s Eastern Ghouta on Monday to deliver much-needed aid as regime forces seized more ground in a fierce offensive to retake the battered rebel enclave. The United Nations said 46 trucks had entered Eastern Ghouta and were headed for the main town of Douma, in the first aid delivery since […]
Regime forces advance in Syria’s battered Ghouta
DAMASCUS: Government forces seized territory inside Syria’s rebel enclave Eastern Ghouta on Saturday, intensifying fighting as tens of thousands of civilians in the besieged enclave near Damascus awaited urgently needed aid. On another front in Syria’s seven-year civil war, Turkish air strikes killed 36 pro-regime fighters in a Kurdish enclave near Turkey’s border. Syria’s war […]
Fighting continues in Syria enclave despite truce: UN
DAMASCUS: Fighting raged on in Syria’s Eastern Ghouta on Tuesday, making relief operations in the rebel enclave impossible despite a “humanitarian pause” announced by Russia, the United Nations said. “Fighting continues this morning. That is what our reports from Eastern Ghouta tell us,” said Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the UN humanitarian office. “The United […]
Putin orders daily ‘humanitarian pause’ in Eastern Ghouta
MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered a daily “humanitarian pause” to air strikes on the rebel-held Syrian enclave of Eastern Ghouta from Tuesday, Moscow’s defence minister said on Monday. “On the instructions of the Russian president, with the goal of avoiding civilian casualties in Eastern Ghouta, from February 27, tomorrow, from 9.00 to 14.00 […]
Syria’s Ghouta reels from strikes, clashes despite ceasefire call
DAMASCUS: Desperate civilians trapped in one of the most ferocious assaults of Syria’s civil war awaited aid and medical help on Monday after regime air strikes pounded rebel-held Eastern Ghouta despite UN ceasefire demands. More than 500 people have been killed in a major bombing campaign by President Bashar al-Assad’s forces that has hammered the […]
Death toll in Syria enclave tops 500 after UN delays truce vote
DAMASCUS: New air strikes on the Syrian rebel enclave of Eastern Ghouta on Saturday took the civilian death toll from seven days of devastating bombardment to more than 500 after the United Nations again delayed a vote on a ceasefire. More than 120 children have been among the dead in the bombing campaign that the […]