Troops repulse rebel attack on Aleppo prison

Syrian soldiers have repulsed an attack by rebels on a prison in the northern city of Aleppo, the Britain-based opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported yesterday.

The rebel operation began with co-ordinated car bombs detonated at the main gate early Wednesday. The facility is said to hold 4,000 prisoners, 250 of whom are insurgents.

Meanwhile rebel fighters belonging to al-Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra have published a video of an officer wearing a black balaclava shooting 11 soldiers in the head as they knelt in a line.

"The sharia [Islamic] court for the eastern region in Deir al-Zor has sentenced to death these apostate soldiers that committed massacres against our brothers and families in Syria, " the officer announced as comrades in black chanted "God is great".

A video released on Wednesday showed three other men being executed in revenge for killings in the coastal town of Banias two weeks ago, where opposition activists put the death toll at 145.

Graphic images
Images of Abu Sakkar, a rebel commander, biting the heart of a dead, dismembered soldier emerged earlier this week. He leads a faction called the independent Omar al-Farouk brigade and has been featured in videos showing rockets being fired into Shia villages in Lebanon and posing with the corpse of a fighter from the Lebanese Shia Hizbullah movement. Human Rights Watch has declared the attacks on Lebanese villages a war crime.

BBC correspondent Ian Pannell, who visited the northern town of Saraqueb, was told by local activists that the Syrian army fired two devices containing poisonous gas on civilian areas on April 29th. Eight people were said to have been admitted to hospital with breathing problems; one woman to have died. The evidence remains inconclusive.

Chemical attacks denied
The government vehemently denies deploying chemical weapons and charged rebel forces with using chlorine gas to kill troops and civilians in March.

Meanwhile, Russian president Vladimir Putin is set to meet UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon today as preparations are being made for an international conference aimed at bringing an end to the 26-month war in Syria.

This encounter coincides with the entry into the Mediterranean of Russian warships from Moscow’s Pacific fleet dispatched to bolster its presence in the region. The vessels are en route to Limassol in Cyprus. Secretary of state John Kerry has expressed optimism about US-Russian co-operation in the drive to resolve the crisis.