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Militants Continue Shelling Settlements in Syria's North, Russian Military Says

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The Hayat Tahrir al-Sham* terrorist group shelled settlements in the Syrian provinces of Idlib and Latakia, the head of the Russian centre for Syrian reconciliation said at a daily briefing on Friday.
Sputnik
"We have registered one shelling of the Kuhbaniya settlement in the Latakia province, and one shelling of the Maarrat-Moukhos settlement and one shelling of the Ruayha settlement in the Idlib province by the Nusra* terrorists", Rear Admiral Alexander Shcherbitsky said.

The Russian military specified that no firing was recorded in the Idlib de-escalation zone by Turkish-controlled armed groups over the past 24 hours.

According to Shcherbitsky, the Russian military police have patrolled the Aleppo province, while the air force conducted aerial patrolling in a loop beginning and ending in the Aleppo airfield of Kuweires.

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. In addition, Moscow and Ankara agreed to jointly patrol the M4 highway.

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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