05 August 2016•Update: 06 August 2016
By Mohamed Mesto
ALEPPO, Syria
Syrian opposition forces are very close to lifting the siege imposed on them by Bashar al-Assad’s forces in parts of southwestern Aleppo city, according to official social media accounts of an opposition group.
According to social media accounts of Jaish al-Fatah (Army of Conquest), the opposition group said it was close to breaking the siege after it reached an Assad-controlled artillery school in the city. The operation to capture the school, regarded as one of the most significant strongholds of the Assad’s regime in Aleppo, had been launched along with the Free Syrian Army.
Jaish al-Fatah claims it has taken over an officers’ building and advanced further inside the school; it said it was now only a matter of time before the opposition forces would reach the Ramouseh Roundabout and free the blockaded areas in Aleppo.
The artillery school is said to be a powerful support point in the regime’s supply lines coming from the city of Hama in central Syria, passing through the town of Khanasser in south of Aleppo.
Opposition forces had attempted to control the school several times in the past, but each time they retreated.
In February, the Syrian regime cut the supply route between Aleppo’s northern countryside and opposition-held eastern neighborhood.
In early July, regime forces moved to cut the Castello Road, which links the contested city of Aleppo with opposition-held Idlib, imposing a total blockade on opposition-controlled areas in Aleppo.
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 puts the death toll from the six-year conflict at more than 470,000 people.
