Dozens choke in Aleppo

Dozens of people had to be treated for breathing problems in the Syrian battlefront city of Aleppo after regime helicopters dropped barrel bombs on a rebel-held district yesterday, a monitor said.

In addition, rebel gunfire killed five people in Azamiyeh, a government-controlled area in Aleppo, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The bombs that left more than 70 people choking and in need of treatment were dropped from helicopters on the Sukkari neighbourhood, the Britain-based monitor said, adding most were civilians.

The opposition Aleppo Media Centre charged on its Twitter account that Sukkari was the target of a chlorine attack. No one was killed in the strikes.

Both sides in Syria's complex war have traded accusations of attacks against civilians and use of unconventional weapons including chlorine and mustard gas.

Last month, an investigative panel set up by the UN Security Council said in a report that President Bashar al-Assad's forces had carried out at least two chemical attacks, one in 2014 and another in 2015.

Meanwhile, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir yesterday said there was a possibility of reaching an agreement on a ceasefire in Syria within 24 hours.

Asked at a briefing with reporters in London to comment on the failure of the United States and Russia to agree a ceasefire, Al-Jubeir said he would not describe it as a failure but as a work in progress.

In another development, two Turkish soldiers were killed and five others were wounded when Islamic State launched a rocket attack on two Turkish tanks near the village of al-Waqf in northern Syria, Turkey's military saidyesterday.

Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters seized two villages, the military said, as part of an operation called Euphrates Shield, which started on Aug.24 with Turkey-backed rebels fighting under the loose banner of the FSA taking the border town of Jarablus.