Syrian rebel fighters are evacuated from Aleppo towards rebel-held territory in the west of Aleppo's province on December 22, 2016.

Damascus: The Syrian army announced on Thursday that the country’s second city Aleppo has been fully recaptured from rebel fighters, the government’s biggest victory in the nearly six-year civil war.

“Thanks to the blood of our martyrs and the sacrifices of our valiant armed forces as well as allied forces... the general command of the armed forces announces the return of security to Aleppo,” the army said in a statement.

The announcement came shortly after state television reported that the last convoy carrying rebels and civilians had left eastern Aleppo.

Ahmed Qorra Ali, an official with the rebel group Ahrar Al Sham, confirmed that “the last convoy has left the rebel-controlled area”.

Earlier, the Red Cross said that more than 4,000 fighters had left rebel-held areas of the city in the “last stages” of the evacuation.

The United Nations said it had deployed observers to monitor the final evacuations, under a Security Council resolution adopted on Monday.

Rebel forces, who seized control of east Aleppo in 2012, agreed to withdraw from the bastion after a month-long army offensive that drove them from more than 90 percent of their former territory.

The evacuation agreement was brokered by Russia, which launched air strikes in support of Assad’s regime last year, and Turkey, which has supported some rebel groups. </s> BEIRUT, Dec 22 (Reuters) - The Syrian army said it had retaken Aleppo completely and brought "security and safety" back to the city, as the last group of rebel fighters were evacuated on Thursday.

The evacuation of the rebels, who had been holed up in a small, battered enclave in Aleppo, puts the city entirely under the control of the army and its allies after years of fighting, state television said.

The final phase of the evacuation ended when a convoy carrying nearly 150 people, including fighters and members of their families, departed towards rebel-held areas outside the city, it said.

Broadcasting live, state media showed footage of a convoy crossing from the Ramousah highway junction in south Aleppo to al-Rashideen in the countryside just southwest of the city.

In parallel, two buses carrying people from the pro-government villages of al-Foua and Kefraya, besieged by rebels in Idlib, arrived in government-held Aleppo, state TV said.

Government forces had insisted the two villages must be included in the deal to bring people out of Aleppo.

Under a deal brokered by Turkey and Russia, convoys of buses and cars have shuttled thousands of civilians and fighters out of Aleppo's last rebel-held pocket towards opposition areas outside the city since late last week.

The Syrian army announced in a statement on Thursday "the return of safety and security to the city of Aleppo".

"This victory constitutes an important turning point," it said.

In the western part of the city, held throughout the war by the government, there was celebratory gunfire, fireworks, and street parties on Thursday night, witnesses told Reuters.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government is backed by Russian air power and Shi'ite militias, including Lebanon's Hezbollah movement and Iraq's Harakat al-Nujaba. The mostly Sunni rebels include groups supported by Turkey, the United States and Gulf monarchies.

For four years, the city was split between a rebel-held east and government-held west. During the summer, the army and allied forces besieged the rebel sector before using intense bombardment and ground assaults to retake it in recent months. (Reporting by Ellen Francis in Beirut, Kinda Makieh in Damascus; Editing by Catherine Evans) </s> ALEPPO - The army said Thursday it has retaken full control of Syria's devastated second city Aleppo, scoring its biggest victory against opposition forces since the civil war erupted in 2011.

The announcement came after a landmark evacuation deal that put an end to a ferocious month-long offensive waged on east Aleppo by government forces and allied militia.

Turkish air strikes killed at least 47 civilians including 14 children Thursday in the IS-held town of Al-Bab, which Turkish forces have been seeking to capture for weeks, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said. The raids came a day after 14 Turkish soldiers were killed by militants around Al-Bab, in the country's biggest loss of the campaign so far.

Earlier, the Red Cross said more than 4,000 fighters had left rebel-held areas of the city in the final stages of an evacuation.

The loss of east Aleppo is the biggest blow to Syria's rebel movement in the nearly six-year conflict, which has killed more than 310,000 people.

It puts the government in control of the country's five main cities: Aleppo, Homs, Hama, Damascus, and Latakia.

President Bashar al-Assad's victory in Aleppo is a boon for his allies in Moscow and Tehran and a defeat for the opposition's backers, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and some Western states.

Because of the intensity of these global rivalries - particularly between Russia and the United States - the international community struggled for years to respond to the bloodshed in Syria.

"The liberation of Aleppo is not only a victory for Syria but also for those who really contribute to the fight against terrorism, notably Russia and Iran," state news agency SANA quoted Assad as saying before the army announcement on Thursday.

The evacuation effort had been hampered by heavy snowfall and freezing temperatures, leaving evacuees waiting in unheated buses for hours.

"Overnight between Wednesday and Thursday, in one of the last stages of the evacuation, more than 4,000 fighters were evacuated in private cars, vans, and pick-ups from eastern Aleppo," said Ingy Sedky, the spokeswoman in Syria for the International Committee of the Red Cross.

She said about 34,000 people had left rebel areas of Aleppo under the evacuation plan.

The United Nations said it had deployed observers to monitor the final evacuations, under a Security Council resolution adopted on Monday.

Jens Laerke, spokesman for the UN humanitarian agency, said 31 staff had been assigned for monitoring at the crossing point at Ramussa, the government-held district of southern Aleppo through which evacuation convoys have been leaving.

"It's been a very difficult night. The weather is really harsh, and people are leaving in hundreds of private vehicles at different levels of disrepair," he told AFP.

Heavy snowfall from Wednesday, which blanketed Aleppo and the surrounding countryside, had slowed down the evacuations.

"The bad weather, including heavy snow and wind, and the poor state of vehicles... mean things are moving much more slowly than expected," Sedky said.

Rebel forces, who seized control of east Aleppo in 2012, agreed to withdraw from the bastion after a month-long army offensive that drove them from more than 90 percent of their former territory.

The deal was brokered by Russia, which launched air strikes in support of Assad's regime last year, and Turkey, which has supported some rebel groups.

As part of the Aleppo evacuation deal, it was agreed some residents would be allowed to leave Fuaa and Kafraya, two Shiite-majority villages in northwestern Syria that are under siege by the Sunni Muslim rebels.

About 1,000 people have been able to leave the villages in recent days.

The evacuation of Aleppo's rebel sector is a pivotal moment in a war that has triggered a major humanitarian and refugee crisis.

As well as a major strategic gain for Assad, the rebel withdrawal from Aleppo has given fresh impetus to international efforts to end the conflict.

Russia, Iran and Turkey agreed this week to guarantee Syria peace talks and backed expanding a ceasefire, laying down their claim as the main powerbrokers in the war.

Repeated attempts at peace have failed, but UN envoy Staffan de Mistura has said he hopes to convene fresh talks in Geneva in February.

Formerly the beating heart of Syria's commercial and cultural industries, Aleppo has been split since July 2012 between rebels in the east and the government in the west.

East Aleppo became a powerful symbol for Syria's opposition, which set up its own administration to run schools, electricity, and water there.

Opposition fighters lobbed rockets into government-held territory, and regime forces battered the east with air strikes and artillery.

Moscow's military intervention in support of Assad marked a major turning point in the war.

Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Thursday the Russian air force has killed 35,000 fighters in Syria since it began in September last year.

Turkey launched its own campaign in Syria in late August in support of pro-Ankara rebels, with the aim of ousting Islamic State group militants as well as Kurdish militia from areas near its border. </s> The departure of 4,000 rebel fighters and civilians on Thursday completed the evacuation of what was formerly rebel-held eastern Aleppo. They left the last square kilometre of territory which had remained under nominal rebel control after a Russia and Turkey-backed ceasefire effectively ended the battle on 13 December. Since then, about 40,000 people have left the city amid worsening weather and humanitarian conditions in a fragile and slow-moving evacuation operation.

Rebels had held eastern Aleppo since 2012, but a year of Russian bombing allowed pro-regime forces to gradually encircle their enclave before finally overrunning it in less than a month. With Syria’s civil war far from over, tens of thousands of former Aleppo residents now face a precarious future as refugees in rebel-held Idlib.

With rebel-held Aleppo reduced to a small pocket on the west bank of the Aleppo river and reports of Iranian-backed militias killing civilians in newly captured territory in what the UN called a “meltdown of humanity”, Russia and Turkey made a deal to evacuate rebels and civilians to Idlib province. But on the first full day of the ceasefire, renewed shelling and the refusal of the Iranian-backed militias who had led the regime assault to allow the evacuation put it in doubt.

The evacuation of east Aleppo – if it goes ahead – means the opposition will cede the entire city, Syria’s former commercial capital, to the Assad regime, surrendering the last major urban stronghold where it maintained an active presence.

Rebel-held territory was collapsing rapidly during Monday as pro-regime forces continuously rolled back the frontline in eastern Aleppo. Conditions inside the fast-shrinking rebel enclave were described as “doomsday” by one resident, with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reporting the rebels had already withdrawn from all territory on the east bank of the Aleppo river.

The day began with a pro-regime advance into the strategic districts of Sheikh Saeed and Saliheen, preceded by some of the most intense bombardment of the war. The fall of these areas alone meant the rebels had lost control of at least 90% of the territory they held before the regime launched its ground offensive just over two weeks ago.

The Old City of Aleppo, long a bastion of the Syrian opposition, fell into regime hands after the rebels defending it withdrew fearing being cut off after government soldiers and Iranian-backed militia seized the neighbouring districts of Bab al-Hadid and Aqyul. Pro-Assad forces also took parts of Marjeh as opposition ranks were reportedly divided on whether to leave the city or make a last stand.

Pro-government troops moved to within a kilometre of Aleppo’s ancient citadel on Tuesday as rebel-held districts continued to fall. With up to 70% of eastern Aleppo now back in regime hands, there was fierce fighting as rebels lost control of more territory east of the narrow streets which surround the citadel. Regime forces built on momentum generated over a second consecutive weekend of heavy bombardment and rapid advances. On Monday, Russia vetoed a draft UN security council resolution calling for a ceasefire, ensuring its ally in Damascus remained free to build on its advantage.

Rebels lose a third of their territory in two days

Pro-regime forces led by Iraqi Shia militias and Hezbollah seized control of up to one-third of rebel-held eastern Aleppo after another day of rapid advances. Rebel defences appear to have been fatally weakened since pro-regime airstrikes resumed with renewed ferocity nearly two weeks ago.

The capture earlier in the day of the strategic Sakhour district consolidated Sunday’s regime gains into a wedge that effectively cut rebel territory in two. This manoeuvre briefly left open a small corridor through which rebels withdrew to a new frontline farther south, before pro-regime forces moved to occupy the entire northern third of the rebel enclave.

After 12 days of intense preparatory airstrikes, forces supporting the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, launched a major ground assault on rebel-held eastern Aleppo. The attack was concentrated on the northern part of the rebel enclave; pro-regime forces had been consolidating their control north of this frontline since the siege began in late August. Opposition fighters retreated in the face of a regime advance that captured the areas of Jabal Badro and Masaken Hanano, which was the first district taken by rebels in 2012. Thousands of civilians fled to Kurdish and government-held territory. </s> The war-torn city of Aleppo has been recaptured, the Syrian army said Thursday, marking its biggest victory in the country's long civil war.

"The restoration of security and stability to Aleppo is a victory which forms a strategic juncture and important turning point in the fight against terrorism, from one point, and a blow to the terrorist project and its supporters from another," the army's general command said in a statement posted by the Syrian Arab News Agency.

President Bashar al-Assad's government has full control of Aleppo, the country's most populous city before the war, for the first time since 2012.

The rebel forces agreed to withdraw from the city after a monthlong army offensive drove them from 90 percent of their original territory.

The announcement came hours after the last convoy of residents was reported leaving the city, the last of a weeklong evacuation effort.

But the United States remained wary of the victory, citing reports of increased violence in other parts of the country as well as the future of those evacuated from Aleppo.

"Certainly, seeing these reports that they are claiming to have all of Aleppo, I am in no position to dispute that," U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said. "But they bear responsibility for what they did to Aleppo and Aleppo's citizens."

The United Nations also echoed concerns over increased violence elsewhere in Syria. Speaking Thursday in Geneva, U.N. Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura warned that Idlib, where many evacuees have gone, "could be in theory the next Aleppo."

The International Committee of the Red Cross said that by Thursday, about 34,000 people had left eastern Aleppo, which rebels held for four years in their effort to push Assad from office.

Hundreds more people have left Foua and Kefraya, the villages in Idlib that the government insisted be included in an evacuation agreement.

"Thanks to the blood of our martyrs and the sacrifices of our valiant armed forces as well as allied forces ... the general command of the armed forces announces the return of security to Aleppo after its release from terrorism and terrorists, and the departure of those who stayed there," the army said in a statement, according to the French news agency AFP. </s> A ceasefire has been reached between Moscow and Syrian rebels allowing the evacuation of civilians and fighters from eastern Aleppo, the Russian ambassador to the UN has said.

The amabassador informed the international community on Tuesday evening that the Syrian-led "counter-terrorism operation" in eastern Aleppo will end in a few hours.

The alleged agreemnet will effectively cede the remainder of Syria's largest city to government troops after months of a deadly siege.

The ceasefire comes after the UN reported possible mass killings by government troops as they closed in on the rebels’ last enclave in the city.

Osama Abu Zayd, a Turkey-based legal advisor for an umbrella group of rebel factions known as the Free Syrian Army, said the ceasefire went into effect on Tuesday evening and that the first batch will begin evacuating within hours.

Yasser al-Youssef, a spokesman for the Nour el-Din el-Zinki rebel group, confirmed the ceasefire and said the goal is to evacuate civilians and rebels from besieged areas.

It was not immediately clear whether the hostilities had ceased in Aleppo. The opposition-run Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said shelling was continuing.

World leaders and aid agencies issued dramatic appeals on behalf of trapped residents earlier Tuesday, and the UN human rights office said that pro-government forces reportedly killed 82 civilians "on the spot" as they closed in on remaining rebel districts.

That and other reports of mass killings, which could not be independently confirmed, reinforce fears of atrocities in eastern Aleppo in the final hours of the battle for the city - which has been split between rebel and government control since 2012.

Several residents and opposition activists said that government forces carried out summary killings of rebels in the streets in neighbourhoods captured on Monday, but the Syrian military flatly denied the claims, saying such allegations were "a desperate attempt" to try gain international sympathy. </s> (BEIRUT) — A statement by the Syrian armed forces says the northern city of Aleppo has returned to government control, ending a four-year rebel hold over parts of the city.

The statement broadcast on Syrian TV said the army has re-established “security” in the northern city after the last rebels evacuated from their final toe-hold in the eastern parts of the city.

The Syrian government’s recapture of Aleppo is a major turning point in the Syrian civil war with potentially powerful political repercussions.

It represents a momentous victory for President Bashar Assad and a crushing defeat for Syria’s opposition which will struggle to forge a way forward.

The ancient city has been divided into rebel and government parts since 2012. </s> BEIRUT, MOSCOW: The Syrian army broadcast messages into the last rebel enclave of Aleppo on Tuesday, warning that it was poised to enter the area during the day and urging insurgents to speed up their evacuation of the city.

An operation to evacuate civilians and fighters from rebel-held eastern Aleppo has brought out 37,500 people since late last week and the goal is to complete the process by Wednesday, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.

But it is hard to know if that goal is realistic, given the problems that have beset the evacuation plan so far, and the wide variation in estimates of how many had left and how many still remained. The International Committee of the Red Cross put the number evacuated since Thursday at only 25,000.

A rebel official in Turkey told Reuters that even after thousands had left on Monday, only about half of the civilians who wanted to leave had done so.

The insurgents would only leave once all the civilians who wanted to go had departed, the rebel said. The ceasefire and evacuation agreement allows them to carry personal weapons but not heavier arms.

Estimates of the number of people waiting for evacuation range from a few thousand to tens of thousands.

The United Nations said Syria had authorised the world body to send 20 more staff to east Aleppo who would monitor the evacuation.

A UN official said 750 people had been evacuated from the two besieged government villages of Foua and Kefraya, which government forces had insisted must be included in the deal to bring people out of Aleppo.

The evacuations are part of a ceasefire arrangement that ends four years of fighting in Aleppo, once Syria’s most populous city.

Conditions for those being evacuated are grim, with evacuees waiting for convoys of buses in freezing winter temperatures. An aid worker said that some evacuees had reported children had died during the long, cold wait.

In government-held parts of Aleppo, the mood was very different.

A large crowd thronged to a sports hall in the city, waving Syrian flags and dancing to patriotic music, a large portrait of President Bashar Al Assad hanging on one wall, in a celebration of the rebels’ defeat in the city that was broadcast live on state television.

The rebel withdrawal from Aleppo after a series of rapid advances by the army and allied Shiite militias including Hezbollah since late November has brought Al Assad his biggest victory of the nearly six-year-old war.

However, despite the capture of Aleppo and progress against insurgents near Damascus, the fighting is far from over, with large areas remaining in rebel control in the northwestern countryside and in the far south.

The jihadist Daesh also controls swathes of territory in the deserts and the Euphrates river basin in eastern Syria.

The foreign minister of Iran, one of Al Assad’s main backers, said he hoped an overall ceasefire agreement could be reached for Syria.

Speaking at a meeting with the foreign ministers of Russia and Turkey in Moscow to discuss the future of Syria, Mohammad Javad Zarif said there was no military solution for the Syrian conflict, only a political one. Russia and Iran back Al Assad while Turkey has backed some rebel groups.

The talks, aimed at giving fresh impetus for a solution in Aleppo, went ahead despite the killing of Russia’s ambassador to Ankara by a gunman on Monday.

UN Syria mediator Staffan de Mistura intends to convene peace talks in Geneva on February 8.

Al Assad is backed by Russian air power and Shiite militias including Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement and Iraq’s Harakat Al Nujaba. The mostly Sunni rebels include groups supported by Turkey, the United States and Gulf monarchies.

For four years, the city was split between a rebel-held eastern sector and the government-held western districts. During the summer, the army and its allies besieged the rebel sector before using intense bombardment and ground assaults to retake it in recent months. </s> A rebel official based in Turkey told Reuters that only about half of the civilians who wanted to leave Aleppo had done so after the departure of thousands of people on Monday.

The insurgents would only leave once all the civilians who wanted to had done so, the rebel said. The ceasefire and evacuation agreement allows them to carry personal weapons but not heavier arms.

Late on Monday, Turkey said 20,000 people had left the rebel-held pocket in the south of Aleppo in evacuations on Thursday and Monday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor, said 15,000 had gone.

Estimates of the number of people still waiting for evacuation on convoys of buses range from a few thousand to tens of thousands. The route out of Aleppo runs 5 km (3 miles) to the rebel-held district of al-Rashideen, just beyond the city's southwestern limit.

Civilians are also being evacuated from two mostly Shi'ite Muslim villages near Idlib that have been besieged by rebels for years and taken to Aleppo as part of the deal that allowed the departure of insurgents from the city.

The Hezbollah military media unit reported that eight more buses of evacuees from al-Foua and Kefraya departed at dawn on Tuesday.

The rebel withdrawal from Aleppo after a series of rapid advances by the army and allied Shi'ite militias including Hezbollah since late November has brought President Bashar al-Assad his biggest victory of the civil war.

However, despite the capture of Aleppo and progress against insurgents near Damascus, the fighting is still far from over, with large areas remaining in rebel control in the northwestern countryside and in the far south.

The jihadist group Islamic State also controls swathes of territory in the deserts and Euphrates river basin in eastern Syria.
The Syrian Army says it is now in full control of the city of Aleppo following the evacuation of the last group of rebels to the Idlib Governorate.