Syrian army shells center of Bab city, killing dozens of civilians: SNA spokesperson

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Syrian government shelling of northern Syria's Al-Bab killed 14 civilians and wounded several others, the spokesperson of the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army, Yusuf Hamoud, tweeted on Friday.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) war monitor claimed on Friday that the Syrian army fired artillery shells on al-Bab “a response to the killing of regime soldiers in airstrikes by Turkish fighter jets".

SOHR also said 14 civilians were killed, including five children.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Friday denied involvement in the shelling of the city of al-Bab, after social media accounts blamed the SDF.

“Our forces have nothing to do with this operation either directly or indirectly,” Farhad Shami, head of the SDF Media Center, said in the statement.

SOHR reported that at least 11 people were killed after Turkish airstrikes hit a Syrian military base at the Jarqli village, west of Kobani, on Tuesday, August 16.

Syria's state-run SANA news agency said three soldiers were killed, and six injured in the attack.

A Syrian military source told SANA that any attack on Syrian army points, “will be met with a swift response on all fronts.”

On Tuesday, also several SDF fighters and civilians were killed and injured in Turkish shelling and drone strikes.

Moreover, one Turkish soldier was killed Tuesday by a mortar attack in Karkamış, a border town in Gaziantep province in southeast Turkey.