Deadly strikes hit Syria rebel bastion

Air strikes killed 10 civilians near a bakery and a medical clinic in Syria’s rebel-held Idlib region yesterday, as government forces kept up a ground offensive.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Russian warplanes hit the Idlib province town of Ariha, but the Russian defence ministry said its “aviation did not carry out any combat tasks in this area of Syria.”

The government and its Russian allies have upped their deadly bombardment of Syria’s last major rebel bastion, slowly chipping away at it from the south.

Rebel-held territory has shrunk to just over half of Idlib province, along with slivers of neighbouring Aleppo and Latakia, following a series of government gains.

The saw Damascus loyalists retaking the strategic northwestern town of Maaret al-Numan on Wednesday.

Earlier yesterday, Russian air strikes hit near a bakery and the Al-Shami clinic in Ariha which is now out of service, the Observatory said.

The monitor says it determines whose planes carried out strikes according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions.

A dust-covered doctor ran out of the clinic screaming following the strike, which partially damaged the facility’s walls, an AFP correspondent reported.

Nearby, three entire buildings had collapsed and several vehicles were reduced to mangled wrecks.

The wailing of women and children rang out as rescue workers searched for corpses beneath the rubble.

Toufic Saado, a paramedic, said he was inside the medical facility when three air strikes ravaged the area.

“The wounded were lying on the floor outside the medical centre,” he said.