The Syrian army begins bombing the Ashrafieh and Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhoods in Aleppo after the displacement of thousands of their residents

On Wednesday afternoon, the Syrian army began bombing the predominantly Kurdish neighborhoods of Ashrafieh and Sheikh Maqsoud in the city of Aleppo in northern Syria, shortly after the expiry of a deadline it set for the exit of civilians from them, the day after the outbreak of bloody clashes considered the most violent between the two sides.

On Tuesday, the government and Kurdish forces exchanged accusations of igniting clashes that left nine dead, as negotiations between the Syrian authorities and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) faltered, since they signed an agreement in March that stipulated the integration of the institutions of the Kurdish Autonomous Administration into the framework of the Syrian state.

An Agence France-Presse correspondent in the city reported that the army began shelling the two neighborhoods with artillery and mortar shells at three in the afternoon (12:00 GMT), a deadline after which the army said it would consider the two neighborhoods a “closed military zone,” calling on civilians to “stay away from the positions” of the Kurdish forces.

Thousands of residents, including women, children, and the elderly, left the two neighborhoods through two crossings designated by the authorities, some on foot and others in cars and small trucks. An Agence France-Presse correspondent saw entire families with sullen or crying faces accompanying their children in a state of fear and panic.

Some residents carried their belongings while some took their livestock or pets with them.

The two neighborhoods are mainly controlled by Kurdish security forces, from which hundreds of Kurdish fighters left in April under an agreement with the transitional authorities.

The official news agency SANA, for its part, reported that the Syrian Democratic Forces targeted with shells the vicinity of the Sheikh Maqsoud and Achrafieh neighborhoods, leading to the outbreak of fires that civil defense teams worked to extinguish.