Syrian Army Declares Victory in Aleppo, Next Target Possibly Idlib

The recapture of Aleppo is President Assad’s most important gain so far, in a war that has claimed 300,000 lives.

The Syrian army said it had retaken complete control of Aleppo on Thursday after the last rebel fighters were evacuated from the battered city, handing President Bashar al-Assad his biggest victory of the nearly six-year-old war.

The military said it had brought "the return of safety and security to the city of Aleppo", ending four years of rebel resistance in the northern Syrian city.

"This victory constitutes an important turning point," an army statement said.

The recapture of Aleppo is Assad's most important gain so far in a war that has claimed 300,000 lives. But the fighting is not over with large parts of the country still controlled by insurgent and Islamist groups.

Assad said retaking Aleppo was a victory shared with his Russian and Iranian allies. Russia's air force conducted hundreds of raids that pulverised rebel-held parts of Aleppo. Iranian-backed militias, led by the Lebanese group Hezbollah, poured thousands of fighters into the city.

In the western part of the city, controlled by the government throughout the war, there was celebratory gunfire, fireworks and street parties on Thursday night, witnesses said. Crowds sang, danced and waved flags and pictures of Assad, chanting slogans praising the army and the president.

The last group of rebels and their families holed up in a small eastern enclave of Aleppo were evacuated under a deal that gave the army and its allies full control of the city, Syrian state television said.

At least 34,000 people, both civilians and fighters, have been evacuated from east Aleppo in a week-long operation hampered by severe winter weather, according to the United Nations, which estimates that thousands more remain behind.

The arrival of thousands of refugees from Aleppo in Idlib aroused fears that the rebel-held city in northwestern Syria could be next. Assad has said the war is far from over and his armed forces would march on other rebel areas.

"Many of them have gone to Idlib, which could be in theory the next Aleppo," UN Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura said in Geneva.

He said a cessation of hostilities across Syria was vital if another battle like the bloody struggle for Aleppo was to be avoided.