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Syria's Aleppo facing "war crime": Arab League

Xinhua, November 24, 2016 Adjust font size:

The Arab League (AL) warned against the explosion of the situation in Syria's war-torn Aleppo city that it described as facing "a war crime," the the pan-Arab body said in a statement Wednesday.

"The continuous besiege of Aleppo for more than four months is a war crime that is openly committed in front of the whole world," AL Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul-Gheit said in the statement, stressing the situation in Aleppo is "on the verge of a crisis"

Aboul-Gheit condemned the recent raids launched by the army of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, assisted by Syrian military, against Aleppo.

"Targeting hospitals seems to be an implementation of a deliberate policy that represents a horrible crime against the residents," the AL chief added.

The top Arab diplomat recommended a ceasefire in Aleppo as "urgent priority," noting a ceasefire does not mean displacing Aleppo people under death threat.

"Whoever imagines that he can impose a solution in this way is only illusioned, pushing his country for more division and fragmentation," Aboul-Gheit continued in the statement.

The fighting and bombardment have recently escalated in Aleppo, which is divided between the Assad's troops controlling the western part and the armed rebels in the east, leaving tens of people killed and wounded.

Since it erupted in March 2011, the Syrian crisis has claimed the lives of about 500,000 people and displaced more than 10 million. Endit