Rebels shoot down Syrian helicopter as fighting intensifies
Source: AP
By BASSEM MROUE and SUZAN FRASER
BEIRUT (AP) — Rebels shot down a Syrian military helicopter in northern Syria on Tuesday, killing its crew members in a fiery crash, while the government kept up its relentless bombing campaign on the opposition-held region, with an airstrike in which seven civilians died, activists and news reports said.
The violence in Idlib province came as government troops moved closer to capturing the last rebel-controlled section of a strategic highway linking southern and northern Syria, which would bring the road under the full control of President Bashar Assad’s forces for the first time since 2012.
With support from Russia and Iran, Syrian troops have been on the offensive for weeks in Idlib and parts of nearby Aleppo provinces, unleashing a humanitarian crisis with 700,000 people fleeing their homes and surging north toward the Turkish border.
Nearly a quarter of the 3 million people in Idlib and nearby areas have fled. Terrified families piled onto trucks and other vehicles, clogging muddy rural roads in yet another harrowing exodus in the conflict, now in its ninth year. Hundreds of civilians have died in the latest fighting, according to the United Nations.
Syrian government helicopter is shot by a missile in Idlib province, Syria, Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2020. Syrian rebels shot down a government helicopter Tuesday in the country's northwest where Syrian troops are on the offensive in the last rebel stronghold. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Read more: https://apnews.com/e99ea131c009b43f1b0f4a30dc680565
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