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Militants Shell Settlement in Syria's Idlib, Russian Military Says

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The Hayat Tahrir al-Sham* terrorist group has attacked a settlement in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib, Rear Admiral Alexander Shcherbitsky, the head of the Russian Defence Ministry's centre for Syrian reconciliation, said on Friday.
Sputnik
"We have registered one shelling of Mellaja settlement in Idlib province from the side of the positions of the Jabhat al-Nusra* terrorist organization", Shcherbitsky said at a briefing.

According to the Rear Admiral, no shelling in the Idlib de-escalation zone by illegal armed groups controlled by Turkey has been registered over the past 24 hours. He added that the Russian military police continued patrols along a few routes in Aleppo province.

On Thursday, militants shelled the settlements of Hantutin, Mellaja, and Kafr Nabl in the northwestern province of the war-devastated country.

On 5 March, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, agreed on a ceasefire in Idlib, which started at midnight. The sides also agreed to create a security corridor six kilometres (3.7 miles) north and south of the M4 highway in Syria, which connects the provinces of Latakia and Aleppo.

Militants remain in control of a small pocket of the Idlib province in northwest Syria.

*Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra) is a terrorist organization banned in Russia and many other countries.

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