Aleppo battle intensifies

BEIRUT: New clashes erupted yesterday in an intensifying battle for control over Aleppo’s international airport and nearby military bases in Syria’s north, activists said.
Rebels have tried for weeks to capture Aleppo’s international airport and nearby air bases as part of their campaign to erode the regime’s air supremacy in the 2-year-old conflict.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said clashes erupted anew yesterday around the airport and rebels also intensified their assault on the Nairab and Mannagh air bases near the strategic facility, which has not been handling fights for weeks because of the fighting.
There were also intense clashes at another nearby airfield known as Kweiras, according to the Observatory, a Britain-based anti-regime group that relies on a network of activists on the ground.
Fighting also raged for a second day in the central city of Homs as rebels tried to take back the poor neighborhood of Baba Amr, which they lost to President Bashar Assad’s troops a year ago.
The army still holds large parts of Aleppo and maintains control over the airport, the country’s second largest. Crucially, Syria’s air space is firmly controlled by the regime in Damascus, which uses its warplanes to regularly bomb rebel strongholds.