Russia-US-brokered Syria cease-fire to start at sunset

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said on Monday the state was determined to recover all areas from terrorist groups, the presidency said in a statement on its social media accounts, hours before a U.S.

Syrian opposition forces also said they welcomed the deal.

Ankara’s incursion last month into northern Syria has helped Syrian rebels retake Jarablus from the Islamic State group. The mosque, local reports said, was in bad shape.

President Bashar Assad has promised his government will abide by the terms of the cease-fire, however, no confirmation yet if some major rebel groups will follow suit.

The rebels and the Syrian government are expected to stop attacking one another. The United States has long held that the Syrian leader can not lead any future government, because of his brutal repression of all opposition throughout his time in power, long before the civil war broke out in early 2011.

So far, hundreds of thousands of Syrians have been killed in the civil war that has lasted five years.

Activists say Syrian government forces and their allies are bombing opposition areas in the country’s north, just hours ahead of the start of a USA – and Russia-brokered cease-fire.

In Geneva, the United Nations envoy for Syria said his office would monitor the start of the cease-fire “carefully, before making any hurried comments”.

But in the buildup to the start of the truce, government forces and their allies bombed opposition areas in the north, while al-Qaida-linked militants pushed on with an offensive in the south.

Turkey’s president says his country will send food, clothing and children’s toys to the contested Syrian city of Aleppo after a U.S. -Russia brokered cease-fire takes effect at sundown in the neighboring country.

An activist collective known as the Aleppo Media Center reported at least 45 people had been killed in rebel-held parts of the city, while the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights placed the regional death toll at 69.

After years of government siege and fighting, its remaining residents and rebel fighters evacuated the town in late August under a deal with the regime, which has since retaken control.

Fighting continues across the capital’s eastern outskirts, ahead of a nationwide ceasefire brokered between the U.S. and Russian Federation and due to begin at sunset on Monday.