The Jim Bakker Show

Russian ambassador shot dead in Ankara

Turkish police secure the area near an art gallery where the Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov was shot, in Ankara.

ANKARA (Reuters) – The Russian ambassador to Ankara was shot dead in an attack at an art gallery in the Turkish capital on Monday by a gunman shouting “Don’t forget Aleppo”.

A Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman confirmed the death of envoy Andrei Karlov, which marked one of the most serious spillovers of the Syria conflict into Turkey.

Andrei Gennadiyevich Karlov in a 2005 photo. REUTERS/Korea News Service

Russia is a close ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and its air strikes were instrumental in helping Syrian forces end rebel resistance last week in the northern city of Aleppo.

The Anadolu news agency said the gunman had been “neutralized” soon after the attack, Relations between Moscow and Ankara have long been fraught over the conflict, with the two supporting opposing sides.

The attacker was smartly dressed in black suit and tie, and standing behind the ambassador as he made a speech at the art exhibition, a person at the scene told Reuters.

“He took out his gun and shot the ambassador from behind. We saw him lying on the floor and then we ran out,” said the witness, who asked not to be identified.

A Reuters cameraman at the scene said gunfire rang out for some time after the attack.

A video showed the attacker shouting: “Don’t forget Aleppo, don’t forget Syria!”

As screams rang out, the gunman could then be seen pacing about and shouting as he held the gun in one hand and waved the other in the air.

Another photograph showed four people including what appeared to be the ambassador lying on the floor.

Russia and Turkey have both been involved in the conflict in Syria, which borders Turkey. Turkey has been a staunch opponent of Assad, while Russia has deployed troops and its air force in support of the Syrian leader.

The U.S. State Department, involved in diplomatic contacts with Russia in an attempt to resolve a refugee crisis unfolding around the city of Aleppo, condemned the attack.

Tensions have escalated in recent weeks as Russian-backed Syrian forces have fought for control of the eastern part of the city of Aleppo, triggering a stream of refugees.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the attack. Islamic State militants have been active in Turkey and carried out several bomb attacks on Turkish targets over the last year.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Writing by Daren Butler; editing by Ralph Boulton and Mark Trevelyan)

U.S. electors expected to officially confirm Trump victory

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump speaks during a USA Thank You Tour event in Hershey, Pennsylvania, U.S

By David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Electoral College is expected on Monday to officially select Republican Donald Trump as the next president in a vote that is usually routine but takes place this year amid allegations of Russian hacking to try to influence the election.

At meetings scheduled in every state and the District of Columbia, the institution’s 538 electors, generally chosen by state parties, will cast official ballots for president and vice president.

It is highly unlikely the vote will change the outcome of the Nov. 8 election, which gave the White House to Trump after he won a majority of Electoral College votes. The popular vote went to Democrat Hillary Clinton.

But the conclusion by U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia hacked into the emails of the Democratic National Committee in an attempt to sway the election for Trump has prompted Democrats to urge some electors not to vote as directed by their state’s popular ballot.

The leaked emails disclosed details of Clinton’s paid speeches to Wall Street, party infighting and inside criticism about Clinton’s use of a private server to send emails while U.S. secretary of state. The disclosures led to embarrassing media coverage and prompted some party officials to resign.

Trump and his team dismiss intelligence claims of Russian interference, accusing Democrats and their allies of trying to undermine the legitimacy of his election victory.

Russian officials have denied accusations of interfering in the election.

On Sunday, Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta, said it was an open question whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia about the emails, an allegation that Trump’s incoming White House chief of staff, Reince Priebus, denied. A bipartisan group of U.S. senators called for a special committee probe of cyber attacks by Russia and other countries.

The number of Electoral College electors equals the number of representatives and senators in Congress, with each state receiving a share roughly proportional to its population size.

When voters go to the polls to cast a ballot for president, they are actually choosing a presidential candidate’s preferred slate for their state.

A candidate must secure 270 votes to win. Trump won 306 electors from 30 states.

The electors convene meetings in each state to cast ballots about six weeks after each presidential election.

If no candidate reaches 270 in the Electoral College, the president is chosen by the U.S. House of Representatives – currently controlled by Republicans.

(Additional reporting by Julia Harte in Washington; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Thousands evacuated from Aleppo after deal over besieged villages

Evacuees from a rebel-held area of Aleppo arrive at insurgent-held al-Rashideen, Syria

By Angus McDowall and Ellen Francis

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Thousands were evacuated from the last rebel-held enclave of the Aleppo on Monday after a deal was reached to allow people to leave two besieged pro-government villages in nearby Idlib province.

In bitter winter weather, convoys of buses from eastern Aleppo reached rebel-held areas to the west of the city, and more buses left the Shi’ite Muslim villages of al-Foua and Kefraya for government lines, according to a U.N. official and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group.

The United Nations Security Council agreed a resolution calling for U.N. officials and others to be allowed to monitor evacuations from east Aleppo and the safety of civilians still there.

The Syrian ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar Ja’afari, denounced the resolution as propaganda, saying the last of the rebels were leaving and Aleppo would be “clean” by Monday evening.

The recapture of Aleppo is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s biggest victory so far in the nearly six-year-old war, but the fighting is not over with large parts of the country still controlled by insurgent and Islamist groups.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said 20,000 civilians had been evacuated from Aleppo so far.

Nearly 50 children, some critically injured, were rescued from eastern Aleppo, where they had been trapped in an orphanage, the United Nations said.

The evacuation of civilians from the two villages had been demanded by the Syrian army and its allies before they would allow fighters and civilians trapped in Aleppo to depart. The stand-off halted the Aleppo evacuation over the weekend.

“Complex evacuations from East Aleppo and Foua & Kefraya now in full swing. More than 900 buses needed to evacuate all. We must not fail,” Jan Egeland, who chairs the United Nations aid task force in Syria, tweeted.

INTENSE COLD, LONG WAIT

Ahmad al-Dbis, a medical aid worker heading a team evacuating patients from Aleppo, said 89 buses had left the city. “Some evacuees told us that a few children died from the long wait and the intense cold while they were waiting to evacuate,” he told Reuters.

For those still in rebel-held Aleppo, conditions were grim, according to Aref al-Aref, a nurse and photographer there.

“I’m still in Aleppo. I’m waiting for them to evacuate the children and women first. It’s very cold and there’s hunger. It’s a long wait,” he told Reuters. “People are burning wood and clothes to keep warm in the streets.”

Photographs of people evacuated from Aleppo showed large groups of people standing or crouching with their belongings or loading sacks onto trucks.

Children in winter clothes carried small backpacks or played with kittens. One older man, in traditional Arab robes and headdress, sat holding a stick.

Evacuees from a rebel-held area of Aleppo arrive at insurgent-held al-Rashideen, Syria December 19, 2016. REUTERS/Ammar Abdullah

BUSES BURNED

On Sunday, some of the buses sent to al-Foua and Kefraya to carry evacuees out were attacked and torched by armed men.

That incident threatened to derail the evacuations, the result of intense negotiations between Russia – Assad’s main supporter – and Turkey, which backs some large rebel groups.

The foreign and defence ministers of Russia, Iran and Turkey will hold talks in Moscow on Tuesday aimed at giving fresh impetus for a solution in Aleppo.

At stake is the fate of thousands of people still stuck in the last rebel bastion in Aleppo after a series of sudden advances by the Syrian army and allied Shi’ite militias under an intense bombardment that pulverised large sections of the city.

They have been waiting for the chance to leave Aleppo since the ceasefire and evacuation deal was agreed late last Tuesday, but have been prevented from doing so during days of hold-ups.

In the square in Aleppo’s Sukari district, organisers gave every family a number to allow them access to buses.

“Everyone is waiting until they are evacuated. They just want to escape,” said Salah al Attar, a former teacher with his five children, wife and mother.

CAMP IN TURKEY

Thousands of people were evacuated on Thursday, the first to leave under the ceasefire deal that ends fighting in the city where violence erupted in 2012, a year after the start of conflict in other parts of Syria.

They were taken to rebel-held districts of the countryside west of Aleppo. Turkey has said Aleppo evacuees could also be housed in a camp to be constructed in Syria near the Turkish border to the north.

For four years the city was split between a rebel-held eastern sector and the government-held western districts. During the summer, the army and its allies besieged the rebel sector before using intense bombardment and ground assaults to retake it in recent months.

A Reuters reporter who visited recaptured districts of Aleppo in recent days saw large swathes reduced to ruins, with rubble everywhere and sections of the famous Old City all but destroyed.

Traders began to return to their stores in the Old City to see if they could be fixed up.

One merchant, Jamal Deeb, said: “We are all here to see what the situation is like, and to consider reconstructing the stores. We do not want to leave things as they are, hand in hand we want to rebuild everything once again.”

Assad is backed in the war by Russian air power and Shi’ite militias including Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement and Iraq’s Harakat al-Nujaba. The mostly Sunni rebels include groups supported by Turkey, the United States and Gulf monarchies.

East of Aleppo, several villages held by Islamic State have been captured by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a coalition of militias backed by the United States that includes a strong Kurdish contingent, the Observatory said.

The advance is part of a campaign backed by an international coalition to drive Islamic State from its Syrian capital of Raqqa.

(Reporting by Angus McDowall, Humeyra Pamuk, Stephanie Nebehay, writing by Giles Elgood, editing by Peter Millership)

Buses evacuate thousands of exhausted Aleppo residents in ceasefire deal

Syrians walking in rubble, trying to leave Aleppo warzone

By Laila Bassam, Suleiman Al-Khalidi and Tom Perry

ALEPPO, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Thousands of people were evacuated on Thursday from the last rebel bastion in Aleppo, the first to leave under a ceasefire deal that would end years of fighting for the city and mark a major victory for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

A first convoy of ambulances and buses with nearly 1,000 people aboard drove out of the devastated rebel-held area of Aleppo, which was besieged and bombarded for months by Syrian government forces, a Reuters reporter on the scene said.

Syrian state television reported later that two further convoys of 15 buses each had also left east Aleppo. The second had reached the rebel-held area of al-Rashideen, an insurgent said.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said late on Thursday that some 3,000 civilians and more than 40 wounded people, including children, had already been evacuated.

ICRC official Robert Mardini told Reuters there were no clear plans yet for how to ship out rebel fighters, who will be allowed under the ceasefire to leave for other areas outside government control.

Women cried out in celebration as the first buses passed through a government-held area, and some waved the Syrian flag. Assad said in a video statement the taking of Aleppo – his biggest prize in more than five years of civil war – was a historic moment.

An elderly woman, who had gathered with others in a government area to watch the convoy removing the rebels, raised her hands to the sky, saying: “God save us from this crisis, and from the (militants). They brought us only destruction.”

Wissam Zarqa, an English teacher in the rebel zone, said most people were happy to be leaving safely. But he said: “Some of them are angry they are leaving their city. I saw some of them crying. This is almost my feeling in a way.”

Earlier, ambulances trying to evacuate people came under fire from fighters loyal to the Syrian government, who injured three people, a rescue service spokesman said.

“Thousands of people are in need of evacuation, but the first and most urgent thing is wounded, sick and children, including orphans,” said Jan Egeland, the U.N. humanitarian adviser for Syria.

Staffan de Mistura, the U.N. special envoy for Syria, said about 50,000 people remained in rebel-held Aleppo, of whom about 10,000 would be evacuated to nearby Idlib province and the rest would move to government-held city districts.

Behind those fleeing was a wasteland of flattened buildings, concrete rubble and bullet-pocked walls, where tens of thousands had lived until recent days under intense bombardment even after medical and rescue services had collapsed.

The once-flourishing economic center with its renowned ancient sites has been pulverized during the war that has killed more than 300,000 people, created the world’s worst refugee crisis and allowed for the rise of Islamic State.

‘PLACE THEM ALL IN IDLIB’

The United States was forced to watch from the sidelines as the Syrian government and its allies, including Russia, mounted an assault to pin down the rebels in an ever-diminishing pocket of territory, culminating in this week’s ceasefire.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Thursday that the Syrian government was carrying out “nothing short of a massacre” in Aleppo. U.N. aid chief Stephen O’Brien will brief the Security Council on Friday on the Aleppo evacuation.

The Syrian White Helmets civil defense group and other rights organizations accused Russia of committing or being complicit in war crimes in Syria, saying Russian air strikes in the Aleppo region had killed 1,207 civilians, including 380 children.

In a letter submitted to the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria and seen by Reuters on Thursday, the groups listed 304 alleged attacks carried out in the Aleppo area primarily between July and December and said there was a “high likelihood” of Russia responsibility.

The Russian U.N. mission was not immediately available to comment on the allegations. Russia has said it stopped air strikes in Aleppo in mid-October.

In Aleppo’s rebel-held area, columns of black smoke could be seen as residents hoping to depart burned personal belongings they do not want to leave for government forces to loot.

A senior Russian general, Viktor Poznikhir, said the Syrian army had almost finished its operations in Aleppo.

But the war will still be far from over, with insurgents retaining their rural stronghold of Idlib province southwest of Aleppo, and the jihadist Islamic State group holding swathes of the east and recapturing Palmyra this week.

Rebels and their families would be taken toward Idlib, a city in northwestern Syria that is outside government control, the Russian Defence Ministry said.

Idlib province, mostly controlled by hardline Islamist groups, is not a popular destination for fighters and civilians from east Aleppo, where nationalist rebel groups predominated.

A senior European diplomat said last week the fighters had a choice between surviving for a few weeks in Idlib or dying in Aleppo. “For the Russians it’s simple. Place them all in Idlib and then they have all their rotten eggs in one basket.”

Idlib is already a target for Syrian and Russian air strikes but it is unclear if the government will push for a ground assault or simply seek to contain rebels there for now.

The International Rescue Committee said: “Escaping Aleppo doesn’t mean escaping the war … After witnessing the ferocity of attacks on civilians in Aleppo, we are very concerned that the sieges and barrel bombs will follow the thousands who arrive in Idlib.”

SHI’ITE VILLAGES

The evacuation deal was expected to include the safe passage of wounded from the Shi’ite villages of Foua and Kefraya near Idlib that are besieged by rebels. A convoy set off to evacuate the villages on Thursday, Syrian state media said.

Efforts to evacuate eastern Aleppo began earlier in the week with a truce brokered by Russia, Assad’s most powerful ally, and Turkey, which has backed the opposition. That agreement broke down following renewed fighting on Wednesday and the evacuation did not take place then as planned.

A rebel official said a new truce came into effect early on Thursday. Shortly before the new deal was announced, clashes raged in Aleppo.

Government forces made a new advance in Sukkari – one of a handful of districts still held by rebels – and brought half of the neighborhood under their control, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group.

The Russian Defence Ministry said – before the report of the government forces’ advance in Sukkari – that the rebels controlled an enclave of only 2.5 square km (1 square mile).

The evacuation plan was the culmination of two weeks of rapid advances by the Syrian army and its allies that drove insurgents back into an ever-smaller pocket of the city under intense air strikes and artillery fire.

By taking control of Aleppo, Assad has proved the power of his military coalition, aided by Russia’s air force and an array of Shi’ite militias from across the region.

Rebels have been backed by the United States, Turkey and Gulf monarchies, but that support has fallen far short of the direct military assistance given to Assad by Russia and Iran.

Russia’s decision to deploy its air force to Syria more than a year ago turned the war in Assad’s favor after rebel advances across western Syria. In addition to Aleppo, he has won back insurgent strongholds near Damascus this year.

(Reporting by Laila Bassam in Aleppo and Tom Perry, John Davison and Lisa Barrington in Beirut, Michelle Martin in Berlin, John Irish in Paris, Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva and Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Writing by Angus McDowall in Beirut and Giles Elgood in London; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Peter Cooney)

U.S. may target weapons seized by Islamic State in Palmyra

Islamic State fighters search weapon boxes in a Russian base in what is said to be Palmyra,

By Phil Stewart and David Alexander

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The head of U.S. forces fighting Islamic State said on Wednesday the United States may target weapons seized by the group when it captured the Syrian city of Palmyra, adding the equipment posed a danger to the U.S.-led coalition in the region.

Army Lieutenant General Stephen Townsend told a Pentagon video briefing that the weapons seized by Islamic State likely included armored vehicles, guns and possibly air defense equipment or other heavy weaponry.

He hoped Russia or Syria would quickly retake Palmyra and neutralize the threat, but cautioned the United States would stand ready to strike if needed, including if the looted weapons started moving out of the city.

“Basically anything they seized poses a threat to the coalition but we can manage those threats and we will,” Townsend said. “I anticipate that we’ll have opportunities to strike that equipment and kill the ISIL that’s operating it soon.”

Still, he cautioned that Russia or Syria would have a far better sense of who was on the ground and would be in a better position to react quickly.

“We can’t tell one side from the other. So we can’t tell if the truck and the armored vehicle is being operated by a regime trooper, a Russian trooper or ISIL fighter,” he said, using an acronym for Islamic State.

Islamic State recaptured the ancient city of Palmyra on Sunday despite dozens of Russian air strikes to push back the militants, exposing the limitations of the Russian backing that has turned the tide of the conflict in Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s favor.

The focus of Syria’s overstretched army on defeating insurgents in their last urban stronghold of Aleppo may have diverted resources needed to defend the city, where Moscow in recent months beefed up its defenses.

Palmyra, with its Roman-era city and spectacular ruins, had been recaptured from the militants last March, in what was hailed as a major victory for the government and the biggest reversal for Islamic State in Syria since Russia’s intervention.

‘FLEETING VICTORY’

“(They) took their eye off the ball there, the enemy sensed weakness and struck and gained a victory that I think will probably be fleeting,” Townsend said.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that if it were true the militants seized an anti-aircraft missile system, the threat from Islamic State “is worse because of the failed strategy of the Syrians and the Russians.”

By taking full control of Aleppo, Assad has proved the power of his military coalition and dealt a crushing blow to rebel hopes of ousting Assad after revolting against him during the 2011 Arab uprisings.

Rebels have been supported by the United States, Turkey and Gulf monarchies, but the support they have enjoyed has fallen far short of the direct military backing given to Assad by Russia and Iran.

Townsend said he expected rebels who lost Aleppo would take their fight elsewhere in Syria but that it was unlikely to significantly affect the U.S.-backed effort against Islamic State – including a bid to capture the group’s stronghold of Raqqa, Syria.

“Our estimate is they’ll probably go somewhere else that is more important to them, and I won’t care to comment on where we think that might be,” he said.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart and David Alexander; Editing by Peter Cooney)

‘Tiger’ Israel has wary eye on Iran after Syrian rebels lose Aleppo

Israeli soldiers stand atop tanks in the Golan Heights near Israel's border with Syria

By Luke Baker

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The fall of Aleppo to Syrian government forces backed by Russia and Iran has heightened alarm in Israel about potential threats to its borders and a wider reshaping of the region.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu left no doubt on Wednesday about the depth of Israel’s concern about Tehran, whose position and that of its proxies in Syria has been strengthened by the crushing of rebel resistance in Aleppo.

At a meeting in Astana with Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Netanyahu was asked whether he had a message for Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, who is scheduled to visit Kazakhstan next week.

“Don’t threaten us. We are not a rabbit, we are a tiger,” the Jerusalem Post newspaper quoted Netanyahu as telling Nazarbayev. “If you threaten us, you endanger yourself.”

Asked by Nazarbayev if he seriously believed Iran wanted to destroy Israel, Netanyahu replied: “Yes, I do.”

The more than five-year-old civil war in Syria has enabled Iran, whose Supreme leader has called for an end to the Jewish state, to steadily increase its influence across the region.

Whether via its own Revolutionary Guard forces or Shi’ite Muslim proxies, especially Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia, Tehran’s reach extends from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean Sea.

As well as concerns about an increased flow of arms now Iran has access to a port on the Mediterranean at Tartus, on the southern Syrian coast, Israel worries Hezbollah, emboldened by Iran’s patronage, may launch new attacks on its territory.

There have been isolated border incidents in recent months, and Israel and Hezbollah fought a war in 2006 in which more than 1,000 Lebanese and 160 Israelis were killed. Large populations in Israel and Lebanon were displaced and major infrastructure in southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut was destroyed.

While Hezbollah’s ranks have suffered in the fighting in Syria — Israeli officials estimate 1,700 fighters have been killed and 7,000 wounded — the group has restocked its weaponry and retains an arsenal of at least 100,000 rockets, Israeli and independent analysts say.

In recent weeks, unclaimed airstrikes have targeted southern Syria and near Damascus. Syria has pointed the finger at Israel, which has made no comment. But Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said last week Israel was working “to prevent the smuggling of sophisticated weapons, military equipment and weapons of mass destruction from Syria to Hezbollah.”

WARY OF IRAN

Avi Dichter, the chair of Israel’s foreign affairs and defence committee and the former head of the Shin Bet intelligence agency, said Iran had tried several times in the past to move forces into the Syrian Golan Heights, next to territory that Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

Those moves were repelled, Dichter told Reuters. But he said that, with Iran flush with cash and confidence after last year’s agreement restricting Iran’s nuclear program, it was possible further attempts would be made to test Israel’s responses.

“Iran has a strategic plan,” he said. “It might bring Iranian troops closer to Israel, either Revolutionary Guards, who are pure Iranians, or others, like Hezbollah or the Basij militia, which might be a very good cover for them.”

Beyond the threat from Iran and its proxies, Dichter has warned that Israel, widely thought to be the only nuclear capable state in the Middle East despite maintaining a policy of ambiguity, must not put too much confidence in Russia. The Israeli government sees Moscow as an ally but Dichter says it could shift position if its interests are threatened.

Dichter believes Russia has long-term aspirations in the Middle East which could bring fundamental changes to the borders of the region, depending largely on how incoming U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin interact.

“Those two leaders might not just think but act in order to create what we call a new Middle East,” Dichter said.

He called Russia the “supreme decider” in Syria but made clear the immediate concerns were Iran and Hezbollah.

“We have no intention to allow Hezbollah to test their sophisticated weapons because there are no other targets in the Middle East except Israel when Hezbollah and Iran think about an offensive initiative,” said Dichter. “By all means Israel is going to stop it, never mind whether by alerts or activities or any other tools.”

(Editing by Timothy Heritage)

Aleppo rebel evacuation under way after ceasefire deal

A still image from video taken December 15, 2016 over eastern Aleppo shows an operation to evacuate thousands of civilians and fighters in buses from Aleppo, Syria

By Laila Bassam, Suleiman Al-Khalidi and Tom Perry

ALEPPO, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – An operation to evacuate thousands of civilians and fighters from the last rebel bastion in Aleppo began on Thursday, part of a ceasefire deal that would end years of fighting for the city and mark a major victory for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

A convoy of ambulances and buses with nearly 1,000 people aboard drove out of the devastated rebel-held area of Aleppo, which was besieged and bombarded for months by Syrian government forces, a Reuters reporter on the scene said.

A Syrian official source told Reuters that a second convoy was likely to bring people out on Thursday.

Women cried out in celebration as the buses passed through a government-held area, and some waved the Syrian flag.

An elderly woman, who had gathered with others in a government area to watch the convoy set off, raised her hands to the sky, saying: “God save us from this crisis, and from the (militants). They brought us only destruction.”

Earlier, ambulances trying to evacuate people came under fire from fighters loyal to the Syrian government, who injured three people, a rescue service spokesman said.

“Thousands of people are in need of evacuation, but the first and most urgent thing is wounded, sick and children, including orphans,” said Jan Egeland, the U.N. humanitarian adviser for Syria.

Turkey is considering establishing a camp in Syria for civilians being evacuated from Aleppo and the number of people brought out of the city could reach 100,000, Deputy Prime Minister Veysi Kaynak said.

In Aleppo’s rebel-held area, columns of black smoke could be seen as residents hoping to depart burned personal belongings they do not want to leave for government forces to loot.

RUSSIAN DRONES

A senior Russian general, Viktor Poznikhir, said the Syrian army had almost finished its operations in Aleppo. Since August, around 3,000 rebels had left and 108,000 civilians had been moved to safe parts of the city, he said.

Rebels and their families would be taken towards Idlib, a city in northwestern Syria which is outside government control, the Russian defense ministry said.

Idlib province, mostly controlled by hardline Islamist groups, is not a popular destination for fighters and civilians from east Aleppo, where nationalist rebel groups predominated.

A senior European diplomat said last week that the fighters had a choice between surviving for a few weeks in Idlib or dying now in Aleppo. “For the Russians it’s simple. Place them all in Idlib and then they have all their rotten eggs in one basket.”

Idlib is already a target for Syrian and Russian air strikes but it is unclear if the government will push for a ground assault or simply seek to contain rebels there for now.

The International Rescue Committee said: “Escaping Aleppo doesn’t mean escaping the war.

“After witnessing the ferocity of attacks on civilians in Aleppo, we are very concerned that the sieges and barrel bombs will follow the thousands who arrive in Idlib.”

A rebel official said a new truce came into effect early on Thursday. Shortly before the new deal was announced, clashes raged in Aleppo.

The Russian defense ministry said – before the report of the government forces’ advance in Sukkari – that the rebels controlled an enclave of only 2.5 square km (1 square mile).

RAPID ADVANCES

By taking control of Aleppo, Assad has proved the power of his military coalition, aided by Russia’s air force and an array of Shi’ite militias from across the region.

Rebels have been backed by the United States, Turkey and Gulf monarchies, but that support has fallen far short of the direct military assistance given to Assad by Russia and Iran.

The government and its allies have focused the bulk of their firepower on fighting rebels in western Syria rather than Islamic State, which this week managed to take back the ancient city of Palmyra, once again illustrating the challenge Assad faces reestablishing control over all Syria.

(Reporting by Laila Bassam in Aleppo and Tom Perry, John Davison and Lisa Barrington in Beirut, Michelle Martin in Berlin; Writing by Angus McDowall in Beirut and Giles Elgood in London, editing by Peter Millership)

Aleppo assault likely a war crime, says U.N. as evacuation stalls

Boys stand amid the damage in the government-held al-Shaar neighborhood of Aleppo, during a media tour, Syria

By Laila Bassam, Lisa Barrington and John Davison

ALEPPO, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Plans to evacuate besieged rebel districts of Aleppo were under threat on Wednesday as renewed airstrikes and shelling rocked the Syrian city in a bombardment the United Nations said “most likely constitutes war crimes”.

Iran, one of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main backers, imposed new conditions on a ceasefire deal, saying it wanted the simultaneous evacuation of wounded from two villages besieged by rebel fighters, according to rebel and U.N. sources.

There was no sign of that happening. Instead airstrikes, shelling and gunfire erupted in Aleppo and Turkey accused government forces of breaking the truce agreed less than a day before. Syrian state television said rebel shelling killed six people.

There were clashes on the ground later in the day, with rebels saying they launched an attack against government forces using suicide car bombs.

A ceasefire brokered by Russia, Assad’s most powerful ally, and Turkey was intended to end years of fighting in the city, giving the Syrian leader his biggest victory in more than five years of war. The evacuation of rebel-held areas was expected to start in the early hours of Wednesday, but did not materialize.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein, said he was appalled that the deal appeared to have collapsed.

“While the reasons for the breakdown in the ceasefire are disputed, the resumption of extremely heavy bombardment by the Syrian government forces and their allies on an area packed with civilians is almost certainly a violation of international law and most likely constitutes war crimes,” he added.

There was no immediate indication when the evacuation of civilians and rebel fighters might take place but a pro-opposition TV station said it could be delayed until Thursday. Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Russian leader Vladimir Putin agreed in a phone call to make a joint effort to start the process, Turkish presidential sources said.

There was no sign of Iran’s conditions being met. Insurgents fired shells at the two majority-Shi’ite villages from which Tehran wanted wounded to be evacuated, Foua and Kefraya, in Idlib province west of Aleppo, causing some casualties, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov predicted that rebel resistance in Aleppo would last no more than two or three days. The defense ministry in Moscow said the rebels now controlled an enclave of only 2.5 square km (1 square mile).

Civilians fill containers with water in a rebel-held besieged area of Aleppo, Syria December 14, 2016. REUTERS/Abdalrhman Ismail

RAPID ADVANCES

Nobody had left by dawn under the plan, according to a Reuters witness waiting at the departure point, where 20 buses stood with engines running but showed no sign of moving into rebel districts.

People in eastern Aleppo had packed their bags and burned personal belongings, fearing looting by the Syrian army and its Iranian-backed militia allies.

Officials in the military alliance backing Assad could not be reached immediately for comment on why the evacuation had stalled.

U.N. war crimes investigators said the Syrian government bore the main responsibility for preventing any attacks and reprisals in eastern Aleppo and that it must hold to account any troops or allied forces committing violations.

In what appeared to be a separate development from the planned evacuation, the Russian defense ministry said 6,000 civilians and 366 fighters had left rebel-held districts over the past 24 hours.

A total of 15,000 people, including 4,000 rebel fighters, wanted to leave Aleppo, according to a media unit run by the Syrian government’s ally Hezbollah.

By taking full control of Aleppo, Assad has proved the power of his military coalition, aided by Russia’s air force and an array of Shi’ite militias from across the region.

Rebels have been supported by the United States, Turkey and Gulf monarchies, but the support they have enjoyed has fallen far short of the direct military backing given to Assad by Russia and Iran.

Russia’s decision to deploy its air force to Syria 18 months ago turned the war in Assad’s favor after rebel advances across western Syria. In addition to Aleppo, he has won back insurgent strongholds near Damascus this year.

FEAR STALKS STREETS

As the battle for Aleppo unfolded, global concern has risen over the plight of the 250,000 civilians who were thought to remain in its rebel-held eastern sector before the sudden army advance began at the end of November.

The rout of rebels in Aleppo sparked a mass flight of terrified civilians and insurgents in bitter weather, a crisis the United Nations said was a “complete meltdown of humanity”. There were food and water shortages in rebel areas, with all hospitals closed.

On Tuesday, the United Nations voiced deep concern about reports it had received of Syrian soldiers and allied Iraqi fighters summarily shooting dead 82 people in recaptured east Aleppo districts. It accused them of “slaughter”.

The Syrian army has denied carrying out killings or torture among those captured, and Russia said on Tuesday rebels had “kept over 100,000 people in east Aleppo as human shields”.

Fear stalked the city’s streets. Some survivors trudged in the rain past dead bodies to the government-held west or the few districts still in rebel hands. Others stayed in their homes and awaited the Syrian army’s arrival.

“People are saying the troops have lists of families of fighters and are asking them if they had sons with the terrorists. (They are) then either left or shot and left to die,” said Abu Malek al-Shamali in Seif al-Dawla, one of the last rebel-held districts.

(Reporting by Laila Bassam in Aleppo and Tom Perry, John Davison and Lisa Barrington in Beirut; Writing by Angus McDowall in Beirut; Editing by Giles Elgood and Pravin Char)

‘Get us out of here’: desperate Aleppo residents fear arrest, death

Children walk together as they flee deeper into the remaining rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Syria

By Laila Bassam and Lisa Barrington

ALEPPO, Syria / BEIRUT (Reuters) – As the four-month siege of eastern Aleppo neared its end, some survivors trudged in the rain past dead bodies to the government-held west or the few districts still in rebel hands.

Others stayed in their homes and awaited the Syrian army’s arrival.

For all of them, fear of arrest, conscription or summary execution had added to the daily terror of bombardment.

The United Nations said it had reports that Syrian government troops and their Iraqi militia allies had killed civilians in eastern Aleppo, including 82 people in four different neighborhoods in the last few days.

Speaking from a small area still under rebel control, father of five Abu Ibrahim, said he knew of two families executed by the advancing militias that have formed the vanguard of the assault on Syria’s second city.

The United Nations also said it was concerned about reports that hundreds of young men leaving rebel-held territory had been detained.

People walk as they flee deeper into the remaining rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Syria December 13, 2016. REUTERS/Abdalrhman Ismail

President Bashar al-Assad’s opponents have accused the government of mass arrests and forced conscription. The government has denied this and accused rebels of compelling men to fight in their ranks.

On Sunday foreign journalists were invited to a ceremony where Syria’s army enlisted 220 men, including former rebels and others from areas captured by the government.

“You have been recalled to obligatory service,” Brigadier Habib Safia told the men in the military police headquarters in a government-held Aleppo district.

One of the men, Mohammed Hilal, in his 20s, said he and some comrades had escaped from the east along with more than 60 families and that he was ready to join the army.

WIPED OFF THE WORLD

Those still trapped in eastern Aleppo have been using social media to distribute messages they feared would be their last.

“This is a message from someone saying farewell and who could face death or arrest at any time,” a medic working in Aleppo wrote via the Whatsapp messaging service.

“Trapped from all sides, death comes from the sky in barrels … Remember what you had in Aleppo, that there was a city called Aleppo wiped off the map and from history by the world.”

Abu Yousef, in his thirties, said he and his family fled bombardments, tanks and executions in his home neighborhood of Bustan al-Qasr.

“Thanks to god, we are still alive … the regime is constantly bombing us. My two children are injured, I am injured. The regime wants to kill us all. We are very afraid,” he said.

“You tell me ‘may God protect you’. I don’t want God to protect us, we want a solution! We want a cessation of hostilities. We want someone to get us out of here. It’s enough. People are dying,” he said.

The UN has called for international oversight for civilians and rebel fighters as the government takes over.

“The only way to alleviate the deep foreboding and suspicion that massive crimes may be under way both within Aleppo, and in relation to some of those who fled or were captured, whether fighters or civilians, is for there to be monitoring by external bodies, such as the UN,” UN human rights office spokesman Rupert Colville said.

Children’s charity War Child said: “What we are witnessing in Aleppo is a humanitarian catastrophe of historic proportions, bearing comparison to infamous disasters of the past – such as Srebrenica and Guernica.”

IT’S HELL

East Aleppo’s civil defense rescue organization, which pulled many hundreds of dead and injured from rubble over years of the war, told Reuters rescue services had stopped.

“Our machinery and equipment is all broken. We have nothing left … We are working with our hands just to get people from under the rubble,” said Ibrahim Abu Laith, an official from the civil defense group also known as the White Helmets.

The civil defense wrote on its Twitter account on Tuesday it could no longer keep track of the numbers of dead.

“There is no total number of casualties in besieged Aleppo today, all streets and destroyed buildings are full with dead bodies. It’s hell.”

With hospitals bombed out of service, aid stocks exhausted and a brutal bombing campaign in recent weeks, people in east Aleppo are desperate.

“People, even those wanted (by the regime) have started to flee to the regime from the intensity of the shelling, hunger, cold and amount of injuries which are not treated, in addition to the corpses in the streets … Planes and artillery are hitting strongly places where civilians are gathering,” the medic said in his message.

UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein warned that what we are seeing now in Aleppo could happen to populations of other towns outside government control such as Douma, Raqqa and Idlib.

“The crushing of Aleppo, the immeasurably terrifying toll on its people, the bloodshed, the wanton slaughter of men, women and children, the destruction – and we are nowhere near the end of this cruel conflict,” Zeid said.

(Reporting by Lisa Barrington, John Davison, Ellen Francis and Angus McDowall in Beirut, Laila Bassam in Aleppo and Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman; Editing by Janet McBride)

Battle of Aleppo ends after years of fighting as rebels agree to withdraw

People walk as they flee deeper into the remaining rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Syria

By Laila Bassam and Stephanie Nebehay

ALEPPO, Syria/GENEVA (Reuters) – Rebel resistance in Syria’s Aleppo ended on Tuesday after years of fighting and months of bitter siege and bombardment that culminated in a bloody collapse of their defenses this week, as insurgents agreed to withdraw in a ceasefire.

Rebel officials said fighting would end on Tuesday evening and insurgents and the civilians who have been trapped in the tiny pocket of territory they hold in Aleppo would leave the city for opposition-held areas of the countryside to the west.

News of the deal, confirmed by Russia’s U.N. envoy, came after the United Nations voiced deep concern about reports it had received of Syrian soldiers and allied Iraqi fighters summarily shooting dead 82 people in recaptured east Aleppo districts. It accused them of “slaughter”.

“My latest information is that they indeed have an arrangement achieved on the ground that the fighters are going to leave the city,” Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters. It could happen “within hours maybe”, he said.

A surrender or withdrawal of the rebels from Aleppo would mean the end of the rebellion in the city, Syria’s largest until the outbreak of war after mass protests in 2011.

By finally dousing the last embers of resistance burning in Aleppo, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s military coalition of the army, Russian air power and Iran-backed militias will have delivered him his biggest battlefield victory of the war.

However, while the rebels, including groups backed by the United States, Turkey and Gulf monarchies, as well as jihadist groups that the West does not support, will suffer a crushing defeat in Aleppo, the war will be far from over.

Govermental Syrian forces fire into sky as celebrating their victory against rebels in eastern Aleppo, Syria December 12,2016. REUTERS/ Omar Sanadiki

“MELTDOWN OF HUMANITY”

The rout of rebels from their ever-shrinking territory in Aleppo has sparked a mass flight of civilians and insurgents in bitter weather, a crisis the United Nations said was a “complete meltdown of humanity”.

“The reports we had are of people being shot in the street trying to flee and shot in their homes,” said U.N. spokesman Rupert Colville. “There could be many more.”

The Syrian army has denied carrying out killings or torture among those captured, and its main ally Russia said on Tuesday rebels had “kept over 100,000 people as human shields”.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon briefed the 15-member U.N. Security Council at 12 p.m. (1700 GMT) at the request of Britain and France. France said it had called for a meeting to focus on possible war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Colville said the rebel-held area was “a hellish corner” of less than a square kilometer, adding its capture was imminent.

The Syrian army and its allies could declare victory at any moment, a Syrian military source had said, predicting the final fall of the rebel enclave on Tuesday or Wednesday, after insurgent defenses collapsed on Monday.

(Reporting By Laila Bassam in Aleppo, Orhan Coskun in Ankara, Lisa Barrington and Tom Perry in Beirut, Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman and Tom Miles and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Writing by Angus McDowall in Beirut; Editing by Pravin Char and Peter Millership)

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