UPDATE - Russia, Assad regime hit targets in Syria’s Idlib, Hama

ADDS NEW DEATH TOLL

By Burak Karacaoglu and Esref Musa

IDLIB, Syria (AA) - Russia and the Bashar al-Assad regime carried out scores of airstrikes Monday in Syria’s Idlib and Hama provinces, killing at least 15 civilians, according to local civil defense sources.

Mostafa Haj Youssef, director of Syria’s White Helmets civil defense force, told Anadolu Agency that both Syrian and Russian aircraft had conducted “more than 90” airstrikes in southern Idlib and northern Hama.

"At least 15 civilians, most of them children and women, were killed in the airstrikes, which have been ongoing since early Monday morning," Youssef said.

He said the airstrikes mainly targeted the southern and eastern parts of Idlib and some areas in northern Hama.

Idlib notably falls within a network of de-escalation zones endorsed by Turkey, Russia and Iran in which acts of aggression are expressly forbidden.

Syria has only just begun to emerge from a devastating civil war that began in early 2011 when the Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.