The skies above Aleppo fell quiet Tuesday morning ahead of a planned, unilateral ceasefire as Russian jets were grounded to set the stage for a “humanitarian pause” later this week.
“Today the airstrikes of Russia’s Aerospace Forces and Syria’s Air Force stop in the Aleppo area from 10 a.m.,” a statement posted on the Russian Ministry of Defense’s Facebook page said. “The long-term suspension of airstrikes is necessary to introduce a ‘humanitarian pause’ on October 20.”
Residents of the battered Syrian city told CNN they had heard no bombing early on Tuesday.
The temporary pause in airstrikes will allow civilians to flee the city via “six corridors,” according to Gen. Sergei Shoigu. He added that Syrian forces will withdraw and give rebels a chance to leave the beleaguered city via a further two corridors.
“We’re calling on the leadership of the countries who have influence on the armed groups in the eastern part of Aleppo with a proposal to convince their leaders to stop military actions and leave the city,” the statement added.
“Anyone who is really interested in the early stabilization of the situation in the city of Aleppo need(s) to embark on real political steps and not continue shuffling political papers.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the planned truce is a “manifestation” of the Russian military’s “goodwill.”
“This is an obvious continuation of Russian efforts, on the one hand, to fight terrorists in Syria, and on the other, to unblock the situation in Aleppo,” he said Tuesday. “It is exclusively a manifestation of goodwill by the Russian military.”
Family wiped out
The cessation comes hours after airstrikes killed 20 members of the same family — including nine children.
Moscow has helped bolster the Syrian regime’s airstrikes on rebel-held parts of Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and the site of a humanitarian catastrophe.
The announcement of the ceasefire came about the same time that EU foreign ministers called on Russia to “halt indiscriminate bombing by the Syrian regime.”
The UN says that Thursday’s eight-hour pause is not long enough to effect any aid operations.
And there’s no promise the bloodshed won’t resume after that eight-hour break.
10 children killed in airstrikes Monday
The 20 members of the same family were killed in airstrikes on the neighborhood of Marjah in rebel-held east Aleppo Monday morning, according to activists at the Aleppo Media Center (AMC) and the White Helmets group.
Two six-week old babies — a boy and a girl — were among those killed, according to a list of names and ages listed by the AMC.
In recent days, hundreds of civilians have died amid the Syrian army’s renewed offensive on rebel-controlled parts of the city.
A video shows some of the children killed lying shoulder-to-shoulder on the side of a street, wrapped in white cloth. A man squats and kisses one of the infants on the forehead before carrying the bodies away.
Since Sunday, airstrikes have killed at least 45 people in two neighborhoods in Aleppo, the AMC said.
The death toll continued to climb after Moscow vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution Saturday to stop the bombing in Aleppo and allow access for humanitarian aid.
As the strikes have continued, Western powers accused Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his supporters of war crimes.
Both the United States and United Kingdom have mulled potential economic sanctions against Syria and Russia due to the Aleppo crisis.