Russian airstrike kills 11 in Syria’s Idlib

By Halit Suleyman

IDLIB, Syria (AA) – At least 11 people were killed and 25 others injured Saturday when Russian fighter jets struck an opposition-held neighborhood in western Syria’s Idlib province, according to a local civil defense official.

The Russian strike targeted a drug warehouse and a civil defense center in Turmanin neighborhood, Vasik Harak told Anadolu Agency.

He said the raid has left a number of houses destroyed and caused a fire, but fire fighters managed to put it out.

Syria has been locked in a vicious 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.

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