Airstrikes kill 15 civilians in northwest Syria: Monitor

Regime and Russian airstrikes on Saturday killed 15 civilians, more than half of m children, in rthwestern Syria where ramped up attacks by two allies have claimed hundreds of lives since April.

Idlib and parts of neighboring provinces of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia are under control of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a jihist group led by Syria's former Al-Qaeda affiliate. region is supposed to be protected from a massive government offensive by a September buffer zone deal, but it has come under increasing bombardment by regime and its Russian ally over past three months.

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In Idlib town of Ariha, seven children were among 11 civilians killed in Syrian airstrikes that targeted two residential buildings and also wounded 28 or people, said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. One of de was a small boy who was found under rubble by White Helmets rescuers, his face bloodied and his body covered in white dust, a photographer who works with AFP said from scene.

He also witnessed rescuers digging through rubble of a collapsed roof for more victims, while a member of White Helmets moved body of a young man into back of a pickup truck. Ariha me helines after it was pummelled Wednesday by warplanes that claimed lives of 10 civilians, according to Observatory, when a picture of three sisters struggling for ir lives went viral on social media networks.

picture showed two dust-covered girls trapped in rubble and clutching ir baby sister by her shirt as she dangles from a bombed-out building. One of girls later died of her wounds while or two are hospitalized and fighting to stay alive, according to local medics. Russian airstrikes on rrn Hama province Saturday that hit an ambulance killed three rescuers while ar child died in Syrian regime bombardment elsewhere in Idlib region, Observatory said.

Save Children said on Thursday that number of children killed in Idlib over past four weeks h exceeded number slain in same region in whole of last year.

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Airstrikes by Syrian regime and its ally Russia on Idlib region have claimed more than 740 lives since late April, according to war monitor. UN says more than 400,000 people have been displaced. UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has documented 39 attacks against health facilities or medical workers in area in three months.

At least 50 schools have been damd by airstrikes and shelling over same period, it said. UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet on Friday condemned "international indifference" in face of mounting death toll in Idlib.

"se are civilian objects, and it seems highly unlikely, given persistent pattern of such attacks, that y are all being hit by accident," Bachelet said.

"Intentional attacks against civilians are war crimes, and those who have ordered m or carried m out are criminally responsible for ir actions," she said.

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region under attack is home to some three million people, nearly half of m alrey displaced from or parts of country. war in Syria has killed more than 370,000 people and displaced millions since it started in 2011 with a brutal crackdown on anti-government protests.