AMMAN: Government forces killed at least 36 people, 14 of them children, in a bombardment of rebel-held areas on the outskirts of Damascus yesterday, Syrian opposition
activists said.
Video footage showed women weeping over the dismembered bodies of children strewn across a field in Eastern Ghouta, near an air defence base on the edge of the town of Muleiha, 5km east of Damascus. The air, rocket and artillery campaign is the heaviest since rebels overran a helicopter base and missile base near Damascus two months ago and encroached on the main international airport, inching steadily closer to the capital, the sources said. Russia urged the rebels to make counter-proposals to those made by President Bashar Al Assad in a recent speech to start a dialogue that could end the fighting.
Muleiha is the last major fortification in the area east of Damascus not yet to have fallen to the rebels. REUTERS
