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Beirut /Â AFP
Fighting in parts of Syria on Sunday threatened a shaky ceasefire brokered by Russia and Turkey, whose efforts to kickstart talks towards ending the conflict won backing from world powers. The nationwide truce between the regime and non-extremist rebels aims to smooth the way for peace talks in Kazakhstan later this month orchestrated by Damascus’s allies Moscow and Tehran and rebel backer Ankara.
The UN Security Council on Saturday unanimously approved a resolution supporting the Russian and Turkish initiative aimed at ending the nearly six-year-old war that has killed more than 310,000 and displaced millions.
Air raids and clashes have continued to shake parts of the country since the ceasefire started at midnight Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor of the war.
Four civilians and nine rebels have been killed since the truce took effect, according to the group, which relies on a network of sources in Syria for its information. The air strikes and fighting “are unlikely to lead to the ceasefire collapsing, but they are violations of the deal,” Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.
In northern Syria, regime air strikes Sunday targeted the rebel-held town of Atareb, the monitor said.
On Saturday night, rebels shelled Fuaa and Kafraya, two besieged Shiite-majority villages in northwestern Syria. Outside Damascus, the Observatory reported exchanges of fire between the regime and rebels in Eastern Ghouta, where President Bashar al-Assad’s forces have waged a months-long offensive to retake an opposition bastion.
The truce excludes the IS group and former Al-Qaeda affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front. Saturday’s UN resolution “welcomes and supports the efforts by Russia and Turkey to end violence in Syria and jumpstart a political process” and hails the planned talks in the Kazakh capital Astana as “an important step”.
The measure also calls for the “rapid, safe and unhindered” delivery of humanitarian aid in Syria.
In Eastern Ghouta’s Hammuriyeh area, Syrian activists late Saturday marked the New Year by decorating a tree with lights and pictures of the war’s victims over the past year, an AFP photographer said.
The Observatory says a total of 60,000 people lost their lives in violence across Syria in 2016, more than 13,000 of them civilians.