Today, Thursday, the Russian Ministry of Defense said that about forty Syrian soldiers were killed and eighty others were injured, as a result of an attack by gunmen in Idlib Governorate (northwestern Syria).
And the Russian "Interfax" news agency quoted the ministry as saying that about two hundred gunmen participated in the attack on advanced sites of the Syrian army yesterday, and the ministry added that it killed about fifty militants participating in the attack.
For its part, the Syrian News Agency (SANA) reported that the locations of the regime forces in the axes of Tah, Abu Harif and al-Samaka in the southern and eastern Idlib villages were subjected to a violent attack by what they described as terrorist groups.
The agency added that the attack included booby-trapped vehicles and under heavy fire cover, noting that the regime forces had redeployed them to the sites after they were infiltrated by the opposition gunmen, and that the clashes are still going on there.
Russian raids
On the other hand, the Al-Jazeera correspondent in Syria reported that nine people were killed and others wounded in Russian and Syrian air strikes targeting a gathering of displaced people near Saraqib in Idlib countryside.
Five people from one family were killed and others were wounded in Russian air strikes, and four people were killed and others wounded in Russian raids on the towns of Arnabeh and Ariha in Idlib countryside.
It is reported that in May 2017, Turkey, Russia and Iran announced that they had reached an agreement to "escalate the de-escalation zone" in Idlib, within the framework of the Astana meetings on Syrian affairs.
However, the regime forces and their supporters continue to launch attacks in the region, despite the understanding concluded between Turkey and Russia on September 17, 2018 in the Russian city of Sochi to install a "de-escalation".