Militants Intensified Shelling Aleppo Killing 15 People, Injuring 150 Read more

ALEPPO (Syria) (Sputnik) – Militants sharply intensified shelling the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, leaving 15 civilians killed and over 150 injured within last 24 hours, the Russian center for Syrian reconciliation at the Hmeimim airbase said on Saturday.

“In the last 24 hours a total of 15 civilians were killed, more than 150 sustained wounds of varying severity. Those are primarily fragment wounds of legs, hands and stomach,” the reconciliation center said.

More than 100 shells are said to have been fired during the last 24 hours.

A total of eight districts of Aleppo came under fire. Militants are using gas bottles rigged with explosives, makeshift mines and unguided shells. Militants are targeting schools, hospitals and social facilities.

“My children died – a son and a daughter aged 15 and 20. When the mine exploded, they embraced each other out of fear and died together,” a crying woman said.

The central hospital of Aleppo is overcrowded. All operating theaters are occupied; there are no



places in intensive care units. But doctors say that the hospital has enough medicines and is ready to help all injured people.

“The shell hit our house, the house burned, everything is destroyed. The explosion ripped my son’s legs off and now I do not know where he is … Terrorists are using something powerful, something like rockets, but nevertheless we will win and get rid of them soon,” an old man with a blooded face said.

The militants also shelled a primary school in Aleppo leaving three pupils dead and nine more injured.

Syria has been in a state of civil war since 2011, with government forces fighting the Syrian opposition groups striving to overthrow President Bashar Assad. In parallel, Damascus has to counter numerous extremist groups, in particular, the Daesh (outlawed in Russia).

The opposition is being supported by the West — the Unites States and the European Union — which also are in favor of Assad's overthrow, while Russia supports the current leader as the only legitimate Syrian authority.