Child among 3 killed, 30 injured in attacks by Russian, Syrian regime forces in northwestern Syria

By Ahmet Karaahmet and Mehmet Burak Karacaoglu

IDLIB, Syria (AA) - Three people were killed, including a child, and 30 others were injured, including children and women, in attacks by Russian and Syrian regime forces in northwestern Syria on Friday.

A Russian airstrike in the Jisr al-Shughur district of Idlib province killed at least one child and injured four others, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) in a statement.

Three Russian fighter jets conducted the airstrike on the village of Farm Hajj Hamud, SOHR said, adding that the injured were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.

It noted that the Russian warplanes also struck the village of Qarqur in the rural areas of the Hama province, but no casualties have been reported so far.

Meanwhile, the Syrian regime army attacked the Darat Izza district in Aleppo province on Friday, killing at least two civilians and injuring 13 others.

In another attack on the same day, the regime forces and its allied militias stationed in the southwest Idlib city of Saraqib, bombarded Idlib with artillery and surface-to-surface weapons, the White Helmets civil defense organization said in a statement.

The agency added that six children and five women were among the injured, and they were all taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.

The Syrian regime has yet to comment on the attack and bombings its forces carried out since early Friday.

Türkiye, Russia, and Iran agreed to establish four "de-escalation zones" in Syria in areas that would not be controlled by the Syrian regime at a meeting in Astana, Kazakhstan in 2017.

However, the Syrian regime in Damascus, Iran-backed terrorists, and Russia continued their attacks, seizing three of the four districts and heading for Idlib.

Although Türkiye reached an additional agreement with Russia to strengthen the cease-fire in Sept. 2018, attacks intensified again in May 2019.

On March 5, 2020, Ankara and Moscow reached a new cease-fire agreement for northwestern Syria, which was largely maintained.

In the 2017-2020 period, about 2 million civilians fleeing the attacks were forced to migrate to areas near the Turkish border.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar in Ankara