DHAKA: Syrian rebels have regained control of a strategic base near Aleppo international airport in fierce fighting that left more than 50 people dead.

A monitoring group said on Saturday, reports The Straits Times.

Troops backed by fighters from Lebanese Shia militant group Hizbollah had recaptured large parts of Base 80 outside Syria’s main northern city in an assault on Friday morning.

But rebel fighters, among them Al-Qaeda loyalists, counter-attacked after dark, using Grad rockets against the army’s tanks and recovering all of the lost ground, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

‘As a result of the fighting, the rebels and jihadists have retaken the parts of the base that were captured during the day by the army,’ the watchdog’s director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

BDST: 1814 HRS, NOV 09, 2013
RoR/JCK