Car bomb blast hits evacuation convoy near Aleppo, Syria, killing 24

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CAIRO. KAZINFORM At least 24 people were killed on Saturday when a car bomb struck a convoy of evacuees outside the Syrian city of Aleppo, a British war monitor said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the death toll could yet rise as many people were severely injured in the blast.
Syrian state news, SANA, blamed "terrorists" and said the car bomb_ which was thought to have been a pick-up truck_ struck buses carrying families out of the besieged, pro-government towns Kefraya and Foah in nearby Idlib province.

The attack occurred at a checkpoint in a rebel-held area of Rashidin, just outside Aleppo city.

The convoy consisted of 75 buses and 20 ambulances and had been charged with evacuating some 5,000 people from those besieged, pro-government towns.

This latest batch of evacuation procedures in Syria, which also involves moving thousands of people from the rebel-held towns of Zabadani and Madaya near Damascus, stuttered on Friday.

Kefraya and Foah have been encircled by rebels, including Islamists, for years, and became a focal point for the government during the evacuation of Aleppo at the end of 2016.

Safe passage to government areas for the predominantly Shiite populations of those towns was one of the bargaining chips put forth by President Bashar al-Assad during the evacuation of the thousands of mainly Sunni rebels from east Aleppo city.

Source: EFE .

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