Regime attack kills 5 in Syria’s de-escalation zone

By Halit Suleyman

EASTERN GHOUTA, Syria (AA) – At least five people, including three children, were killed on Tuesday in a Syrian regime attack on a school in the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta.

Eastern Ghouta is located inside one of the recently established de-escalation zones, where attacks are forbidden.

“Mortar shells struck a school in Jisreen town, killing five and injuring 15 others,” Mahmoud Ethem, a member of the Syrian Civil Defense, also known as White Helmets, told Anadolu Agency.

A main opposition stronghold on the outskirts of Damascus, Eastern Ghouta has remained under siege by Syrian regime forces since December 2012.

In May, Russia, Turkey and Iran signed a deal in the Kazakh capital Astana to establish de-escalation zones in war-torn Syria to ensure the continuation of a cease-fire deal reached last December.

During the talks, Eastern Ghouta was designated part of a network of de-escalation zones in which acts of aggression would be expressly forbidden.

Russia and Iran are main backers of the Bashar al-Assad regime, while Turkey supports the Syrian opposition.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity. Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced, according to UN officials.