Syria Cuts Only Road for Militants to Aleppo
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – The Syrian army has cut the only way into militant-held parts of Aleppo, severing the militants' only lifeline from the city to the outside world.
The capture of the Castello Road on Thursday came in the wake of recent advances by the Syrian army in the al-Mallah Farms area northwest of Aleppo.
The army had been attempting to seize Mallah for more than two years as it runs adjacent to the Castello Road, the last route militants can use to access districts they control in the second Syrian city.
The capture of Mallah Farms and Castello Road enables Syrian forces to besiege militant-held neighborhoods of Aleppo and puts them within the firing range of the army.
Two foreign-backed militant groups and a London-based observatory confirmed the Syrian army advances on Thursday in interviews with media, Press TV reported.
"Currently nobody can get in or out of Aleppo," Zakaria Malahifji of Aleppo-based militant group Fastaqim said.
A second militant in the area also said that reinforcements had been sent to take back the positions, "but the situation is very bad," citing heavy government air cover.
A unilateral 72-hour truce declared by the Syrian government on Wednesday does not include militants in Aleppo, mostly belonging to al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front and Daesh terrorists.
The new advances in Aleppo came after Syrian government forces established control over the village of Maydaa east of the capital Damascus.
Scores of Takfiri militants were killed and injured in the village, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Maydaa served as Jaysh al-Islam’s supply line to the militant-held East Ghouta region on the outskirts of Damascus, and was the closest area to Zamir airbase, which foreign-backed terrorists hold east of Damascus.
