Intensified airstrikes by the Russian Air Force and heavy artillery and rocket shelling by the Assad regime forces forced more than 92,000 people from their homes in Idlib and Hama provinces in the past five weeks, local aid workers said.
The Emergency Response Coordinators Team in Northern Syria on Sunday said that 16,751 households comprising an estimated 92,109 people have been displaced from their towns and villages in southern rural Idlib and northwest rural Hama since November 1. The Team said that the fleeing households sought refuge in relatively safer areas in northern Idlib province.
The intensifying bombardment and shelling killed at least 156 people, including 52 children in the period between November 1 and December 8, the aid group added in a statement.
The statement condemned the ferocious onslaught being launched by the Assad regime forces and their Russian backer on northwestern Syria. The Team held Russia directly responsible for the atrocities taking place in northern Syria, noting that these atrocities led to marked increase in civilian casualties in Idlib province.
The Team called on all international bodies concerned with Syria to directly intervene to put an end to the assault on Idlib, urging humanitarian groups to urgently respond to the needs of the people arriving in northern Idlib province.
The Assad regime and Russian air forces stepped up bombardment on Idlib province on Saturday, killing 21 civilians, mostly women and children and wounding about fifty others. Russian jets bombed a popular market and a school in the town of Balioun, while regime helicopters dropped barrel bombs on the village of Abdita. Violent airstrikes also targeted a popular market and a school in the town of Al-Bara. (Source: Syrian National Coalition’s Media Department)