Thousands expected to leave second pocket in Syria’s Ghouta

BEIRUT – Some 7,000 members of a rebel group and their relatives were preparing to leave eastern Ghouta to opposition-held areas north of the country Saturday as part of an agreement to evacuate the second of three pockets held by opposition fighters east of the capital Damascus, Syria’s state media reported.

The expected departure comes a day after an agreement was reached between Faylaq al-Rahman, the second most powerful rebel group in eastern Ghouta, and the Russians to surrender the second of three pockets in eastern Ghouta, where rebels have been holding up over the past years.

Early on Saturday, bulldozers removed giant sand barriers from a main road in the town of Harasta that will be used by the rebels and their relatives on their way to the country’s north.

The government-controlled Syrian Central Military Media said a corridor is being prepared for Faylaq al-Rahman members and their relatives to leave the towns of Zamalka, Arbeen, Ein Tarma and Jobar.

The evacuations come after thousands streamed out of Harasta, the first pocket after a similar negotiated deal for the evacuation of armed fighters and civilians.

Faylaq al-Rahman said in a statement Friday that the deal will lead to the immediate evacuation of sick and wounded people for treatment and to allow aid to enter the besieged area.

The group added that opposition fighters and their relatives who decide to leave eastern Ghouta will head to rebel-held parts of northern Syria while civilians who decide to stay will be guaranteed safety.

It said that Russian military police will deploy in Faylaq al-Rahman-controlled areas including the Arbeen, Zamalka, Ein Tarma and Jobar. A prisoner exchange will take place between the group and the government, the group added.

On Feb. 18, a concerted military offensive, backed by Russian airstrikes, squeezed the rebels and civilians in the area under an intense bombing campaign and tightened the siege. The U.N. estimated that nearly 400,000 people remained in the enclave before the latest offensive began.

The government assault triggered a mass movement of people trying to escape the violence in the Damascus suburbs. Some have moved deeper into the rebel-held enclave, while 105,000 others have crossed the front lines toward government-controlled areas or left to rebel-held parts in northern Syria, according to state news agency SANA.

The government’s crushing offensive killed nearly 1,500 people and wounded more than 5,000, according to opposition activists.

After the departure of Faylaq al-Rahman fighters, the only rebel-held pocket in eastern Ghouta will be the town of Douma that is controlled by the powerful Army of Islam group.

On Saturday, hundreds more left Douma to government controlled area including 700 pro-government supporters that the rebel group had been holding for years, according to SCMM.

In the rebel-held northwestern city of Idlib, a car bomb exploded near a court building killing at least six people and wounding 25, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the opposition’s Syrian Civil Defence.

The French Presidency said in a statement Saturday that President Emmanuel Macron had a phone call with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan the day before in which the French leader said he “had very clearly expressed” his concerns as soon as the Turkish military operation in the Kurdish Syrian enclave of Afrin started.

“Nothing must lead to weakening the pressure” on what is left of the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq, Macron said.

Turkey launched an operation in Afrin to clear it of Syrian Kurdish militia, which Turkey considers to be a security threat, on Jan. 20. It captured the town of Afrin in a major phase of the offensive on Sunday.

Macron agreed with Erdogan to pursue “deep and intense” discussions in coming days about Syria.

____

Associated Press writer Sylvie Corbet contributed to this report from Paris.