Syrian government forces make gains in Southern Aleppo

Syrian government forces have made major gains in southern Aleppo, state media and activists said, leaving rebels with only a small pocket in the city.

Syrian soldiers and Iranian-backed militias now hold 90% of east Aleppo after wresting control of two more neighbourhoods that were once part of the rebel-held and besieged east of the city, as it emerged that opposition fighters were contemplating a deal to evacuate Aleppo.

The advance was preceded by what was reported as some of the most intense bombardment of the war, described as a kind of “doomsday” by one resident, Abdulkafi al-Hamdo, with non-stop artillery shelling through the night and Monday morning and numerous airstrikes.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor, said the regime was now in control of 90% of east Aleppo after seizing the neighbourhoods of Sheikh Saeed and Saliheen on Monday, forcing the rebels into an ever-dwindling pocket of land. Thousands of people had fled the fighting towards government-controlled areas, it added.

"The battle is at its end," Lt Gen Zaid al-Saleh of the Syrian army said.

Many residents of east Aleppo, which was estimated to house a quarter of a million civilians before the latest government offensive, reportedly lived in great deprivation with dwindling food stocks, lack of fuel, water and electricity, and with no functioning hospitals after they were bombed in the campaign. 

Russia, which backs the Syrian government, says more than 100,000 civilians have been displaced by the fighting - including 13,300 in the past 24 hours - and that 2,200 rebel fighters have surrendered.

For much of the past four years it has been divided roughly in two, with the government controlling the western half and rebels the east.

Troops finally broke the deadlock with the help of Iranian-backed militias and Russian air strikes, reinstating a siege on the east in early September and launching an all-out assault weeks later.