Syrian Arab News Agency S A N A
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Damascus, SANA – Syria demanded that the Security Council and the UN Secretary-General to condemn immediately and sternly the recent terrorist attacks which targeted residential neighborhoods in Damascus, Damascus Countryside, and Aleppo provinces.
In two identical letters sent to the head of the Security Council and the UN Secretary-General on Sunday, the Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said that Damascus city and Aleppo city were targeted on Saturday April 23rd 2016 with terrorist attacks by armed terrorist groups who fired 69 rocket shells, mortar rounds, and gas cylinders at them.
The letters said the shelling targeted in an arbitrary manner the areas and neighborhoods of Barzeh, al-Adawi, al-Abbasiyeen, al-Qassa’a, al-Tijara, al-Tadamon, Arnous, al-Malki, Harasta, Harasta Suburb, al-Wafidin Camp, and Adra in Damascus city and Damascus Countryside, in addition to the neighborhoods of al-Mukambo, al-Masharqa, al-Ashrafiye, al-Khalidiye, Jami’et al-Zahra’a, Masaken al-Sabil, and al-Hamadaniye in Aleppo city.
The Ministry said the aforementioned terrorist attacks claimed the lives of 11 civilians and injured 59, most of them women, children, and elderly people, in addition to causing massive damage to houses, schools, hospitals, and infrastructure in those areas.
The letters asserted that these attacks are part of a series of terrorist attacks that targeted many Syrian cities upon instructions from the Saudi and Turkish regimes in a bid to undermine both the Geneva talks and the cessation of hostilities agreement, noting that this was heralded by the withdrawal of the “Riyadh delegation” from the Geneva talks which instructed the terrorist groups it represents to shell Syrian civilians and cities.
The Ministry said these attacks are part of the ongoing daily breaches of the cessation of hostilities agreement carried out by terrorist groups masquerading as “opposition” such as Jaish al-Islam, Ahrar al-Cham, and the “free army,” among others, with these groups exploiting the Syrian Arab Army’s commitment to the cessation of hostilities agreement and the fact that it is exercising the utmost degree of self-restrain by not retaliating to these breaches.
The letters added that these attacks also prove the fact that the aforementioned groups are affiliated to ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra terror organizations, despite the attempts by some states and regimes to market these groups as non-terrorist “moderate armed opposition.”
The Ministry said that these terrorist acts will not dissuade the Syrian Arab Republic’s government from continuing to fight terrorism and from working to achieve a political solution for the crisis in Syria via an intra-Syrian dialogue led by Syria, which would ultimately lead to eliminating terrorism and restoring security and stability to the Syrian people.
The letters were concluded by stating that the government of the Syrian Arab Republic demands that both the Security Council and the UN Secretary-General condemn these terrorist crimes immediately and sternly, in addition to demanding that the Security Council shoulder its responsibility in preserving international peace and security by taking deterring and punitive steps against the regimes and states that support and fund terrorism as per Security Council resolutions 2170, 2178, 2199, and 2253, in addition to calling for issuing these letters as an official Security Council document.
Hazem Sabbagh
