Syria airstrikes hit school area; at least 22 dead

Most kids, reports say; Turks cite Assad forces in bombing

Syrian rescuers search the rubble Wednesday in the village of Hass after airstrikes that first responders said killed more than a dozen people, most of them children
Syrian rescuers search the rubble Wednesday in the village of Hass after airstrikes that first responders said killed more than a dozen people, most of them children

BEIRUT -- Airstrikes in Syria on Wednesday killed up to 22 people, mostly children when warplanes struck a residential area housing a school complex in the northern rebel-held province of Idlib, activists and rescue workers said.

A team of first responders, the Syrian Civil Defense in Idlib, said 22 people were killed and at least 50 wounded in the raids on the village of Hass. Most of those killed were children, the group said in a posting on its Facebook page.

Another activist group, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, gave the same death toll and said 14 children and a woman were among those killed.

The activist-operated Idlib News network, which gave a lower toll of 17 people killed, said the strikes hit as the children were gathered outside the school complex. It said the death toll could rise as some of the wounded were reported to be in critical condition, the network added.

Idlib is the main Syrian opposition stronghold, though radical groups also have a large presence there. It has regularly been hit by Syrian and Russian warplanes as well as the U.S.-led coalition targeting Islamic State militants.

Footage posted by activists online shows a huge plume of smoke rising from the area of the strikes and rescuers rushing casualties away along a dusty road lined with destroyed buildings.

A woman's body is seen being carried on a stretcher while other bodies, covered in cloth and one with only a hat, lie under shrubs and other casualties are ferried away in pickups.

An activist at the scene, Muaz al-Shami, said as many as 10 airstrikes were believed to have hit the residential area.

The video content couldn't be independently confirmed. However, it conforms with reporting on the events depicted.

Earlier in the day, the northern Aleppo province saw a new escalation as a helicopter believed to belong to Syrian government forces dropped barrel bombs in a deadly attack on Turkey-backed opposition forces in the border area, Turkish officials said.

A statement attributed to the field commander of Syria's pro-government troops said any Turkish advances in northern Syria under the pretext of fighting Islamic State militants would be dealt with "forcefully and appropriately."

The barrel bombing was said to have occurred in the village of Tal Madiq, in a part of northern Aleppo where rival groups have been operating, mostly to rout Islamic State militants.

If confirmed, it would be the first attack by Syrian government forces on the Turkish-backed fighters. Turkey's state-run news agency didn't say when the attack occurred and said at least two Syrian opposition fighters were killed and five others wounded. A Syrian opposition spokesman said it took place Tuesday.

The Observatory's chief, Rami Abdurrahman, said helicopters struck as intense clashes were underway between Kurdish-led fighters and Turkey-backed forces in Tal Madiq and that 11 Syrian opposition fighters and five Kurdish fighters were killed.

The Kurdish-led forces are now in control of the village, about 10 miles from the highly prized Islamic State-controlled town of al-Bab. A senior Kurdish commander, however, denied Syrian government bombings of the Turkey-backed fighters, saying it was an attempted explanation for battlefield losses.

"They are trying to find a pretext for the loss. No aircraft were involved," Mahmoud Barkhadan of the main Syria Kurdish militia, the People's Protection Units, told The Associated Press by telephone from the region.

A spokesman for the Syrian fighting group Nour el-Din el-Zinki, Yasser al-Youssef, said the Kurdish-led forces attacked them while they were fighting Islamic State militants. Then Syrian government helicopters followed, he said in a message.

Meanwhile Wednesday, Russia withdrew a request to refuel a fleet of Russian warships in Spain, as NATO allies piled pressure on Spain over concerns that the ships could be used to ramp up air attacks in Syria.

Vasily Nioradze, spokesman at the Russian embassy in Madrid, said Wednesday that the request has been canceled, but he gave no details.

The Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov and escorting vessels have steamed through the North Sea and English Channel in recent days heading to the Eastern Mediterranean. NATO allies had been following the small flotilla. Some of the Russian ships had been due to take on supplies and fuel in Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said that while there had been no plans for the carrier itself to refuel at Ceuta, some of the escort ships could have called at the port after coordinating with Spain.

He pointed out that Spanish representatives had said that such a visit by the Russian ships was no longer advisable "because of the U.S. and NATO pressure."

Konashenkov added that the situation won't affect the carrier group's mission as it has enough supplies to operate on its own.

At talks between NATO defense ministers in Brussels, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the deployment raised concerns that air assaults could increase in Syria, notably in the besieged city of Aleppo.

Blaming Russia for exacerbating a humanitarian disaster there, Stoltenberg said that "men, women and children are dying every day, killed by disgraceful attacks on their homes and even their hospitals."

Just a few hours later, the Spanish Foreign Ministry confirmed in a statement that Russia had withdrawn its request for the stopover.

The ministry said that after reports that the ships involved might take part in supporting military action in Aleppo, it had asked the Russian Embassy for an explanation. The ministry did not say if the Russians had provided any.

Information for this article was contributed by Lorne Cook, Vladimir Isachenkov, Nataliya Vasilyeva, Ciaran Gile and Jan M. Olsen of The Associated Press.

A Section on 10/27/2016

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