The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting Friday on Syria after Russia made such request.
Russia requested the meeting to hear from UN envoy Staffan de Mistura, who will brief the council via videoconference from Geneva at 1400 GMT, diplomats said.
De Mistura earlier took aim at Russia, claiming that Moscow was indiscriminately bombing a city with hundreds of thousands of civilians to flush out just a few hundred Takfiri insurgents.
“We are talking about 900 people, basically, who are becoming the main reason for which there is 275,000 people actually being attacked,” said de Mistura.
“In maximum two months, two-and-a-half months, the city of eastern Aleppo may be totally destroyed,” he told reporters.
The envoy urged militants from the former Al-Nusra Front terrorist group — which renamed itself Fateh al-Sham Front after breaking with Al-Qaeda — to leave Aleppo under a deal to halt strikes by the Russian and Syrian forces.
“If you decide to leave with dignity… I am personally ready to physically accompany you,” he said.
Security Council members were discussing a French-drafted UN resolution calling for a ceasefire in Aleppo.
After holding talks in Moscow on the proposal, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault will head to Washington on Friday to discuss the measure, which calls for ending all flights over Aleppo.
French Ambassador Francois Delattre told reporters that “we have a strong determination to go to a vote” on the draft resolution.
Source: AFP
