ALEPPO // More than 50,000 Syrians joined a growing exodus of terrified civilians from east Aleppo as the United Nations Security Council was set for emergency talks on the fighting in the city.
As government forces pressed on with their assault on the divided city, regime artillery fire killed at least 26 civilians in east Aleppo on Wednesday.
Civilians poured out of the besieged rebel-held east, but faced air strikes and heavy artillery fire by advancing regime forces.
After one mortar attack, the motionless body of a girl was left crumpled in the street, her arm severed and her head pierced by a sliver of shrapnel. Rescue volunteers carried her body away on a motorcycle.
Hundreds also massed in the newly recaptured neighbourhood of Jabal Badro to board government buses heading to west Aleppo.
“The situation of those fleeing is desperate,” said Pawel Krzysiek, head of communications for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Syria.
Syria’s Red Crescent is offering assistance in government-held areas, but does not yet have access to east Aleppo.
Regime forces and their allies have seized a third of the rebel-held sector of Aleppo since launching their offensive to retake the city just over two weeks ago. They now fully control the north-east and are advancing on the he Sheikh Saeed district on the southeastern edges.
As the UN security council gathered for an emergency meeting on Wednesday, a leading Syrian opposition body demanded the UN act immediately to protect the civilians of Aleppo,
In a letter to the UN, the head of the National Coalition, Anas Al Adeh wrote, “The regime of (Bashar Al-) Assad and its allies have turned the liberated areas of Aleppo into a coffin. This escalation is a war crime and a crime against humanity, another item on the Assad regime’s long, bloody, barbaric list.”
Earlier this week, Russian representatives held talks in Ankara with Syrian rebels opposed to President Bashar Al Assad over the possibility of a truce in Aleppo.
Russia is Assad’s main international ally and has played a crucial role in the battles for Aleppo.
Those involved are linked to the opposition Syrian National Coalition and do not include jihadists from the Fateh Al-Sham Front, the new name for Al-Nusra Front after it severed ties with Al-Qaeda.
Turkey is also pressing an unprecedented military incursion inside Syria, backing pro-Ankara rebels as they fight IISIL jihadists and a Kurdish militia, but has been noticeably muted in its criticism of Russian actions in Aleppo since a deal to normalise ties with Moscow in June.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu met Riad Hijab, head of the opposition High Negotiations Committee, on Wednesday, to discuss “efforts to stop the fighting immediately and to deliver humanitarian aid as soon as possible” to Aleppo, according to diplomatic sources.
The UN has for months sought access to the east, but a plan it presented earlier this month to deliver aid has yet to be approved by the Syrian government.
Syria’s opposition National Coalition said it was working with France on a draft UN resolution seeking an immediate ceasefire in Aleppo, though regime ally Russia was likely to veto such a proposal.
* Agence France-Presse