REUTERS - The Syrian army and
its allies are in the "final stages" of recapturing Aleppo after a
sudden advance that has pushed rebels to the brink of collapse in a
shrinking
enclave, a Syrian general said on Monday.
A Reuters journalist
in the government-held zone said the bombardment of rebel areas had continued
non-stop overnight, and a civilian trapped there described the situation there
as resembling Doomsday.
"The battle in
eastern Aleppo should end quickly. They (rebels) don't have much time. They
either have to surrender or die," Lieutenant General Zaid al-Saleh, head
of the government's Aleppo security committee, told reporters in the recaptured
Sheikh Saeed district of the city.
Pro-government
forces were clashing with insurgents in the Fardous district, which was at the
heart of the besieged pocket only days ago, after taking Sheikh Saeed in the
south and Saliheen in the east, a rebel official said.
"The situation
is extremely difficult today," said Zakaria Malahifji of the Fastaqim
rebel group fighting in Aleppo.
The rebels' sudden
retreat represented a "big collapse in terrorist morale", a Syrian
military source said.
Syrian President
Bashar al-Assad, backed by Russia, is now close to taking back full control of
Aleppo, which was Syria's most populous city before the war and would be his
greatest prize so far after nearly six years of conflict.
The Russian Defence
Ministry said that since the start of the Aleppo battle, more than 2,200 rebels
had surrendered and 100,000 civilians had left areas of the city that were
controlled by militants.
"People run
from one shelling to another to escape death and just to save their souls ...
It's doomsday in Aleppo, yes doomsday in Aleppo," said Abu Amer Iqab, a
former government employee in the Sukkari district in the heart of the rebel
enclave.
REBELS
While Aleppo's fall
would deal a stunning blow to rebels trying to remove Assad from power, he
would still be far from restoring control across Syria. Swathes of the country
remain in rebel hands, and on Sunday Islamic State retook Palmyra.
Tens of thousands of
civilians remain in rebel-held areas, hemmed in by ever-changing front lines,
pounded by air strikes and shelling, and without basic supplies, according to
the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based monitoring group.
Rebel groups in
Aleppo received a U.S.-Russian proposal on Sunday for a withdrawal of fighters
and civilians from the city's opposition areas, but Moscow said no agreement
had been reached yet in talks in Geneva to end the crisis peacefully.
The rebel official
blamed Russia for the lack of progress in talks, saying it had no incentive to
compromise while its ally Assad was gaining ground. "The Russians are
being evasive. They are looking at the military situation. Now they are
advancing," he said.
FIGHTING
The Observatory said
the Sheikh Saeed district had fallen to the army in fighting on Sunday night
and early on Monday and troops were firing on the districts of Karam al-Daadaa
and Fardous.
An advance into
those districts would take the army into the heart of the area held by rebels
as recently as Saturday, pushing them towards a last bastion of control on the
west bank of Aleppo's river and the area southwest of the citadel.
The Syrian army is
backed by Russian war planes and Shi'ite militias supported by Iran. The mostly
Sunni rebels include groups backed by the United States, Turkey and Gulf
monarchies as well as hardline jihadists who are not supported by the West.
A correspondent for
Syria's official SANA news agency said the army had taken control of Sheikh
Saeed, and more than 3,500 people had left at dawn.
A Syrian official
told Reuters: "We managed to take full control of the Sheikh Saeed
district. This area is very important because it facilitates access to
al-Amariya and allows us to secure a greater part of the Aleppo-Ramousah
road." The road is the main entry point to the city from the south.
The loss of Palmyra,
an ancient desert city whose recapture from Islamic State in March was heralded
by Damascus and Moscow as vindicating Russia's entry into the war, is an
embarrassing setback to Assad.
The Observatory
reported that the jihadist group carried out eight executions of Syrian
soldiers and allied militiamen in Palmyra on Monday while warplanes bombarded
their positions around the city.
Another four people,
including two children, were shot dead while the jihadists cleared the city of
pro-government forces, it said.
CIVILIANS
The Russian Defence
Ministry said on Monday that 728 rebels had laid down their weapons over the
previous 24 hours and relocated to western Aleppo. It said 13,346 civilians
left rebel-controlled districts of Aleppo over the same period.
The Observatory said
that four weeks into the army offensive at least 415 civilians, including 47
children, had been killed in rebel-held parts of the city.
Hundreds had been
injured by Russian and Syrian air strikes and shelling by government forces and
its allies on the besieged eastern part of the city.
The Observatory said
364 rebel fighters had been killed in the eastern sector. It said rebel
shelling of government-held west Aleppo had killed 130 civilians, including 40
children. Dozens had been injured.
The army on Sunday
took foreign journalists to witness an enlistment ceremony for 220 men,
including former rebels and others from opposition-held areas captured by the
government.
The fate of young
men leaving the shrinking rebel pocket in Aleppo has been a subject of argument
between the two sides.
Opposition supporters
have accused the government of mass arrests and extrajudicial killings, which
Damascus has denied. The government accuses rebels of forcing people to fight
for them and preventing them leaving, which the insurgents deny.
The United Nations
said last week it was concerned about reports that hundreds of young men had
been detained upon leaving the rebel-held enclave.
REUTERS
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