MOSCOW, October 4. /TASS/. Twenty-two settlements in four Syrian provinces came under shelling by militants in the past day, Major General Alexey Bakin, chief of the Russian Center for reconciliation of the conflicting sides in Syria, said on Friday.
"Thirty instances of shelling were reported on October 3. Militants from illegal armed groups shelled the settlements of Binyamin and Sabikiyah in the Aleppo province; the settlements, Nahshebba, Dagdan, Saraf, Ain al-Qantara, Muqatal, and Sandran in the Latakia province; the settlements of Khan Shaykhoun, Abu Dali, Hwain al-Kebir, Niha, al-Qasabiyah, Dreiba, Tell As, Herbet Abdi, and Sukoriyah in the Idlib province; the settlements Kara Jurn, Kafer Nbuda, Qarutiyah, Tell Mawtazi, and al-Hwash in the Hama province," Bakin said.
Four de-escalation zones were established in Syria under the agreement reached by the three Syrian ceasefire guarantor nations, namely Russia, Iran and Turkey, in May 2017. Three of zones are now controlled by Damascus while the fourth one located in the Idlib province and partially in the neighboring Latakia, Hama and Aleppo provinces, is still outside Damascus’ control, with a larger part of it being seized by Jabhat al-Nusra (a terrorist organization outlawed in Russia) militants.
The Russian reconciliation center continues to fulfill assigned tasks after the completion of the military campaign in Syria. The center’s officers regularly travel around the country's liberated areas to assess the humanitarian situation. The main efforts of the Russian military are now focused on assistance to the refugees returning to their homes and evacuation of civilians from de-escalation zones.