The United Nations confirmed that air strikes hit aid convoys near the besieged city of Aleppo on Monday, hours after the Syrian military declared that the week-long ceasefire brokered by the U.S. and Russia was over.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that either Syrian or Russian aircraft were responsible for the strikes, Reuters reported. Secretary of State John Kerry told the Wall Street Journal that Syrian forces were "evidently" behind the attacks.
The aid trucks had delivered humanitarian assistance to an area west of Aleppo before they came under attack. A resident told Reuters that some five missiles had struck the convoys while they were parked at a building belonging to the Syrian Red Crescent, a nonprofit aid organization.
At least 18 of 31 aid trucks in the U.N. and Red Crescent convoy were attacked, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Monday, although he could not verify the number of casualties. Dujarric said the convoy was delivering aid to 78,000 people in the town of Urm al-Kubra, which was hit by multiple strikes.
Activists based in the rebel-held area told Foreign Policy that 12 aid workers, including the Syrian Red Crescent director, were killed in the attack while another 18 were injured. These numbers have not been officially confirmed.
The regime of Syrian President Bashar al Assad has not yet commented on the attacks.
Abu al-Baraa al-Hamawi, a rebel commander, told Reuters that the government is teaming with Russian forces to take "revenge" on opposition-held regions.
Syria’s military command issued a statement earlier Monday announcing that the ceasefire had come to an end, accusing "armed terrorist groups" of violating the truce 300 times. The military charged that rebels had used the truce to rearm while attacking government-held positions.
The State Department announced in response that it was prepared to extend the truce and urged Russia to use its influence with Assad to stop the strikes.
"While we have seen comments attributed to the Syrian military, our arrangement is with Russia, which is responsible for the Syrian regime’s compliance, so we expect Russia to clarify their position," said State Department spokesman John Kirby.
There have been 35 strikes in and around Aleppo since the truce ended Monday morning, according to the Observatory.
The truce brokered by Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov went into effect last Monday and intended to suspend the civil war for a week while allowing aid deliveries into rebel-held areas.
Syria’s civil war has killed 430,000 people since 2011, according to some estimates, and has displaced millions more from their homes.
UPDATE 5:33 P.M.: This post was updated to include new comments from a U.N. spokesman on the number of trucks in a convoy west of Aleppo that were hit by air strikes.