Syrian regime jets 'kill 20, injure 24' in Idlib raids

IDLIB, Syria

Syrian fighter jets killed 20 people and injured 24 more with vacuum bombs dropped in the northwestern city of Idlib and surrounding districts late on Thursday.

A civil defense official in Idlib, Leys el-Faris, told Anadolu Agency that Syrian jets killed seven people in the city, eight in Carcanaz town and five civilians in the Han Seyhun district.

Faris said rescuers had pulled a number of children’s bodies from the wreckage in Carcanaz.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests -- which erupted as part of the Arab Spring uprisings -- with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, more than a quarter of a million people have been killed and more than 10 million displaced across the war-torn country, according to the UN.

The Syrian Center for Policy Research, however, put the death toll from the six-year conflict at more than 470,000 people.

*Reporting by Halit Suleyman; Writing by Can Erozden