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Six killed in fresh mortar attacks in Syrian capital

17 May 2013 02:11 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Six people were killed Thursday when armed groups fired mortar shells at a suburb of the Syrian capital Damascus in clashes between rebels and government troops in the vicinity of a central prison in the northern city of Aleppo, the state media said, APA reports quoting AP.

Mortar shells fired by rebels killed six people and injured 37 others at the suburb of Jaramana, some 10 kilometers southeast of Damascus, local media said.

Jaramana, a suburb dominated by Druze and Christians, has been a target of mortars and explosions that have killed tens of people since last year. It's also known of being loyal to the current administration in Syria.

In the northern city of Aleppo, a military source was cited by the state media as confirming that the government troops repelled on Thursday armed rebels' attack on the city's central prison, killing many rebels and destroying their machineries.

The oppositional Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also confirmed the fighting at the central prison of Aleppo, saying that the troops repelled the rebels' attack.

Separate reports speculated that the rebels were trying to storm the prison in the hope of freeing prisoners whose affiliations are unknown.

Also in Aleppo, the Observatory said that seven rebels were killed and more than 16 injured during violent clashes with government forces around the town of Khan al-Asal.

The Britain-based watchdog also posted a video footage purporting to show members of al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front publicly executing 11 men in a square of the oil-rich city of Deir al-Zour in eastern Syria.

The latest killing in Deir al-Zour was part of other sectarian crimes that have taken place in some hotspots in Syria between the Sunni-led insurgency and the Syrian administration, whose rulers belong to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

On Thursday, the Observatory said that the death toll of a massacre that allegedly took place in the coastal city of Banyas earlier this month rose to 145.

The new death toll came after the Observatory said it had got new evidences proving that dozens of civilians were secretly buried after the massacre.

It accused the Syrian security forces and pro-government gunmen of being behind the mass killing in Banyas, which is a predominantly Sunni city.