Russian airstrikes kill 11 civilians in Syria's Idlib

In an area of northwestern Syria supposed to be free of acts of aggression, on Monday at least 11 civilians were killed and 20 injured in Russian airstrikes, a local civil defense agency said.

Russian warplanes carried out airstrikes on the districts of Maarat Al-Numan, Saraqib, and number of villages in the northwestern province of Idlib, according to the White Helmets.

Following the airstrikes, civil defense teams launched search and rescue efforts.

Additionally, in the first half of November, attacks by the  Assad government and its supporter Russia have displaced some 40,000 civilians within the Idlib de-escalation zone, according to Syria’s Response Coordination Group, a local NGO.

Turkey and Russia agreed last September to turn Idlib into a de-escalation zone where acts of aggression are expressly prohibited.

The Syrian government and its allies, however, have consistently broken the terms of the cease-fire, launching frequent attacks inside the zone.

The de-escalation zone is currently home to some 4 million civilians, including hundreds of thousands displaced in recent years by government forces from throughout the war-weary country.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the government cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and more than 10 million others displaced, according to UN officials.