Civilian evacuation from Aleppo suspended after attack

By Mohamed Misto

ALEPPO, Syria (AA) – The ongoing evacuation of civilians from Syria’s city of Aleppo was temporarily suspended on Friday after pro-regime terrorist groups attacked a civilian convoy that set out from the city’s besieged eastern districts for the nearby city of Idlib.

According to an Anadolu Agency correspondent in Aleppo, pro-Assad regime foreign terrorist groups opened fire on the convoy as it attempted to leave the city.

Under the terms of an earlier agreement between the Assad regime and Syrian opposition groups, civilians trapped in eastern Aleppo will be allowed to go to the opposition-held city of Idlib.

Situated near the border with Turkey, Idlib is located some 65 kilometers (roughly 40 miles) from Aleppo.

In recent days, at least 7,500 civilians have left eastern Aleppo for Idlib, according to Syrian opposition sources.

Syria has been locked in a devastating civil war since early 2011, when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests -- which erupted as part of the "Arab Spring" uprisings -- with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, more than a quarter of a million people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced across the war-battered country, according to the UN.

However, the Syrian Center for Policy Research, a Beirut-based NGO, has put the total death toll from the five-year conflict at more than 470,000.