By Khaled Suleiman

IDLIB, Syria

At least 13 civilians were killed and 21 injured Wednesday in Syrian regime airstrikes in Idlib, in the country’s northwest, a local civil defense official told Anadolu Agency.

"Many women and children were among the dead and injured," said Omer Olwan.

"The injured were taken to field hospitals in the city," he added.

He said civil defense teams and firefighters rushed to the residential district of Khan Sheikhoun, site of the airstrikes, as the attacks caused many buildings to catch fire.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests – which erupted as part of the Arab Spring uprisings – with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, more than a quarter of a million people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced across the war-battered country, according to the UN.

The Syrian Center for Policy Research, however, put the death toll from the six-year conflict at more than 470,000 people.