27 killed as air strikes hit hospital in Aleppo

Beirut/Geneva, April 28

Air strikes hit a hospital in a rebel-held area of Syria's Aleppo and killed at least 27 people, including three children and the city's last paediatrician, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Thursday. The United Nations called on Moscow and Washington to salvage a “barely-alive” ceasefire.

The city of Aleppo is at the epicentre of a military escalation that has undermined peace talks in Geneva to end the five-year-old war and UN envoy Stefan de Mistura appealed to the presidents of the US and Russia to intervene.

Six days of air strikes and rebel shelling in Aleppo, which is split between government forces and rebels, have killed some 200 people in the city, two-thirds of them on the opposition side, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says.

“The catastrophic deterioration in Aleppo over the last 24-48 hours" has jeopardised the aid lifeline that delivers supplies to millions of Syrians, said Jan Egeland, chairman of the UN humanitarian task force. “I could not in any way express how high the stakes are for the next hours and days." The Geneva talks aim to end a war that has killed more than 250,000 people, created the world's worst refugee crisis, allowed for the rise of Islamic State and drawn in regional and major powers but the negotiations have all but failed. — Reuters