MOSCOW, February 15./TASS/. A hospital backed by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in Syrian Idlib province was destroyed in US airstrikes, not by Russian warplanes, Syrian Ambassador to Russia Riyad Haddad told Rossiya 24 television on Monday.
"The Russian Aerospace Forces have nothing to do with this," he said citing intelligence data.
He said the Syrian authorities did not allow international observers to the site of the tragedy at the moment. "The observer speaking about it will most likely lie," the diplomat said, marking that the Syrian government had already faced such problems in the past.
Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) reported that at least seven personnel and patients were killed and eight MSF staffers were missing from the strikes when the hospital in Maarat al-Numan was destroyed on Monday. The organization supposed the hospital could have been destroyed either by Russian warplanes or by Syrian government troops.
Russia’s Aerospace Force launched pinpoint strikes against the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra targets in Syria on September 30 after the Federation Council upper parliament house unanimously approved President Vladimir Putin’s request for the use of the armed forces against terrorists in Syria.
Air strikes are delivered at military hardware, communications centers, transport vehicles, munitions depots and other terrorist infrastructure facilities. The military operation is conducted at the request of Syrian President Bashar Assad.