Morning Star.png Rebel Bid to Break Aleppo Siege Falters Syrian army, with aid of Russian air force, repels Nusra Front attack The Morning Star, London, 2 August 2016 Russian military spokesman Lt Gen Sergei Rudskoi said last night that the Syrian army, backed by Russian air cover, had repelled a massive rebel attack intended to break the siege of Aleppo. The Russian general staff representative added that about 5,000 terrorists, led by the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front, had launched their offensive late on Sunday south-west of Aleppo in a bid to break through the government's encirclement of the rebel-held part of the city. Lt Gen Rudskoi insisted that the Nusra-led rebels had lost 800 fighters, 14 tanks, 10 other armoured vehicles and more than 60 gun trucks. He added that 324 civilians had so far left the militant-controlled part of Aleppo through corridors established by the Syrian government last Thursday. A further 82 militants had laid down their weapons. The UN estimates that 200,000 to 300,000 people may still be trapped in the rebel section of Aleppo with dwindling food and medical supplies. UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura warned on Friday that basic supplies in eastern Aleppo could run out in three weeks. Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed yesterday that a Mi-8 helicopter delivering humanitarian aid to Aleppo had been shot down in Idlib province on its way back to the Khmeimim air base. He added that "from what we know from information provided by the Defence Ministry, all those who were on the helicopter died." Mr Peskov said that the three crew members and two officers had "died heroically because they tried to move the aircraft away so as to minimise losses on the ground." The five deaths make this the most grievous single incident for the Russian military since its involvement in defending Syria against the jihadist offensive. Idlib province has a strong presence of jihadists among both the Nusra Front and other groups fighting against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces. Nusra announced last week that it was changing its name and relinquishing ties with al-Qaida to undermine a potential US and Russian air campaign against its fighters. However, its assertion of independence was undermined somewhat by al-Qaida's statement that it had approved Nusra's proposal beforehand. From: http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-3366-Syria-Rebel-bid-to-break-Aleppo-si ege-falters#.V6BLcvl9601 __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 13896 (20160802) __________ The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus. http://www.eset.com -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum. To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/yclsa-eom-forum/006601d1ecac%24fd39d1d0%24f7ad7570%24%40com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
