Syria: Thousands Flee Onslaught As Death Toll Passes 100

Cover: Syrian family inside a Syrian Arab Red Crescent bus before being evacuated from Douma, Eastern Ghouta province, Syria, on 15th March 2018. (Picture: PA/Samer Bouidani)

More than 100 civilians have been killed in government, Russian and Turkish air strikes and shelling on towns inside Syria, according to a monitoring group, as tens of thousands flee the violence.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said government and Russian forces have been bombing rebel-held areas outside Damascus throughout Friday, killing 64 people in Kafr Batna and 12 in Saqba.

The Syrian Civil Defence search-and-rescue group reported 61 fatalities in Kafr Batna.

The Syrian government is determined to seize Kafr Batna, Saqba and the rest of the besieged eastern Ghouta region from rebels after seven years of war.

The Observatory said Turkish shelling and air strikes have killed another 27 people in the Kurdish-held town of Afrin in northern Syria.

Turkey is waging a war on a Syrian Kurdish militia that controls Afrin and the surrounding region.

Syria's UN ambassador said more than 40,000 civilians left the rebel-held Damascus suburbs of eastern Ghouta in a single day through a new security corridor opened by the government in the city of Hamouria.

He said the government and Syrian Red Crescent were co-ordinating to facilitate the safe transport of people from eastern Ghouta "to temporary shelters that are equipped with all the necessary equipment".

Mr Ja'afari said the government will allow convoys with medical supplies and other aid into the area "if the security circumstances allow".

He accused the UN and other governments of doing nothing to alleviate the suffering "of tens of thousands of people who have tried to flee terrorism".

The Syrian military said its armed forces have captured and cleared dozens of villages, towns and farms east of the capital Damascus consisting of about 70% of eastern Ghouta.

Syrian troops have been on the offensive in the area for three weeks, a campaign that has killed 1,300 civilians.

A statement read by Brigadier General Ali Mayhoub said military operations were "swift and decisive".

It added that Syrian armed forces opened two safe corridors and managed to secure the evacuation of thousands of civilians, who were held "by terrorist groups as human shields".

It called upon all residents of eastern Ghouta to leave the area and go to government-controlled parts of the country.