Syria ceasefire: Focus turns to aid delivery

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said the airstrike killed seven people.

The U.S. and Russian Federation say the Syrian cessation of hostilities that began Monday has largely held and should be extended for another 48 hours despite the United Nations complaining that aid has not yet crossed into Syria from Lebanon, a key part of the deal.

One monitoring group reported five violations occurred in and around Aleppo in the ceasefire’s first hours, while state-run news agency SANA said rebels were responsible for a number of breaches in Aleppo and Homs.

A U.S. -Russia brokered cease-fire in Syria came into effect Monday. He said he has also been in touch with the Americans to get Syrian armed groups to cooperate.

Meanwhile, two convoys of aid for the Syrian city of Aleppo were waiting in no-man’s land on Wednesday after crossing the Turkish border, held up by security fears and disagreements between combatants on the third day of a cease-fire.

Twenty trucks loaded with desperately needed aid for eastern Aleppo have crossed into a buffer zone between Turkey and Syria, a high-level United Nations official said Thursday.

In 2016, an estimated 13.5 million people – including six million children – are in need of humanitarian assistance. The first priority will be the eastern half of Aleppo, Syria’s largest city before the war, where anti-government rebels have managed to hold on despite a blockade by troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad and government airstrikes that have reduced much of the city to rubble.

Russia’s military announced on Thursday evening that the Syrian military was beginning to withdraw from a contested route to Aleppo, suggesting a breakthrough to the deadlock could be coming.

The ceasefire extension “provides us a critical window of opportunity” to assist people there, said David Swanson, a spokesman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

“If they do that, we’re willing and able to go to all these places in the next few days – and we are very hopeful that we will indeed be able to do so”, he added.

The text of the cease-fire agreement has not been released and Russian Federation said it was being kept private at the request of the United States.

Russian Federation and American officials have said the agreement is meant to set the stage for peace talks to resolve the Syrian war, now in its sixth year.

In the lead-up to the cease-fire, 40 days of fighting in Aleppo killed almost 700 civilians, including 160 children, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Poznikhir said Russian Federation had fully met its obligations under the terms of the ceasefire and that Syrian government forces had not returned fire in light of the violations. The dead include 700 civilians, among them 160 children, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. “The regime is refusing to allow aid into Aleppo”, said Aleppo-based activist Baraa al-Halaby.

However the United Nations has said that continuing rows over security caused two aid convoys to get stuck in no-man’s land. It also said three shells were fired at the government-held southern village of Hadar. The raids, he said, had killed 250 people and destroyed up to 15 trucks containing heavy machine guns. It wasn’t known who carried out the airstrike.

The deal, reached on Saturday, would entail USA military cooperation with Russian Federation to target the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other terrorists in Syria, if a seven-day temporary ceasefire holds.

The aid shipment, organized by the youth wing of Turkey’s ruling AKP party, became possible after Turkey-backed Syrian rebels ousted Islamic State group fighters from the town last month.