Russia Pledges to Extend Aleppo Truce through Saturday: UN
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Russia has promised to pause fighting in Syria's militant-held east Aleppo through Saturday, the UN's humanitarian office (OCHA) said, after Damascus made a similar pledge.
"Russia has told the UN that they will implement a daily pause of 11 hours per day for three days, counting from today, Thursday," OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke said in an email to AFP Thursday, as the truce in the devastated city broadly held through day one.
Syria's military, which is backed by Moscow, said late Wednesday that it would also extend the truce until Saturday, but spoke only of an eight-hour halt to the fighting.
Aleppo, once Syria’s commercial and industrial hub, has been divided roughly in two since 2012, with the government controlling the west and terrorists the east.
Syria has been gripped by civil war since March 2011 with various terrorist groups, including Daesh (also known as ISIS or ISIL), currently controlling parts of it.
According to a report by the Syrian Center for Policy Research, the conflict has claimed the lives of over 470,000 people, injured 1.9 million others, and displaced nearly half of the country’s pre-war population of about 23 million within or beyond its borders.
