UN Security Council to meet on Aleppo crisis

United Nations Security Council will hold an urgent meeting today to discuss the crisis in Syria's frontline city of Aleppo, where fighting threatens to unravel international peace efforts. France and Britain called for the meeting as Russia said a new ceasefire in Aleppo could be announced within hours. 

The 15-member council will hear a report from the UN's top political affairs official Jeffrey Feltman on the



situation in Aleppo, where fresh fighting including a rocket attack on a maternity hospital left 19 dead yesterday. 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Moscow that efforts were under way to agree on a freeze in fighting in Aleppo. A surge of violence that erupted on April 22nd has left more than 270 people dead in the divided northern city and undermined efforts to revive peace negotiations.