The Syrian army said it had taken a strategic district
of Aleppo on Tuesday, in what would be the most important advance
in the divided city by Damascus and its allies in weeks, but rebels
said the battle was not over.
The 1070 Apartments district is located on the southwestern
outskirts of Aleppo and lies alongside the government's corridor
into the parts of the city that it controls.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based group that
reports on the war, said government forces and their allies had
seized full control of the district, calling it the most
significant gain by the government in Aleppo since September.
A Syrian military source said the army and allied forces were in
complete control of the area and surrounding hills. They have made
repeated efforts to oust rebels from the 1070 Apartments area since
the summer.
A military media unit run by the Damascus-allied Hezbollah
carried a similar report. Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim
group, is fighting in support of Damascus.
But officials in two rebel groups fighting in Aleppo said the
battle was still raging. Yasser Alyousef from the political office
of the Nour al-Din al-Zinki group said rebels had recovered
positions they had lost on Monday.
"There is still a battle and the result has absolutely not been
decided," added the second official, Zakaria Malahifji, head of the
political office of the Fastaqim rebel group.
Syrian government forces backed by allied militias and Russian
air power launched a major assault on rebel-held eastern Aleppo in
September, after besieging the area that the United Nations says is
home to 275,000 people.
Insurgents launched a counter attack aimed at breaking the siege
on Oct. 29, targeting government-held western districts of Aleppo
in an offensive that included jihadist groups and insurgents
fighting under the Free Syrian Army banner.
But their progress slowed after early gains.
Russia says its air force has been observing a moratorium on air
strikes on the rebel-held districts of eastern Aleppo since Oct.
18. The Observatory and emergency workers in eastern Aleppo said
heavy air strikes had killed hundreds of people, and hit hospitals
and other civilian facilities prior to that.
Insurgent shelling of government-held western Aleppo has
meanwhile killed dozens of people, the United Nations said last
week in an update on the humanitarian situation in the city.