Amman - Two bombs exploded simultaneously on Sunday night next to Syrian army compounds in the northern city of Aleppo, killing and wounding scores of President Bashar al-Assad's forces, residents and opposition activists said.
The bombs targeted makeshift barracks and the military police headquarters, situated in two adjacent sealed off districts in the centre of the city, said several residents and opposition campaigners from Aleppo.
The state news agency said an explosion near a hospital and a school in the Municipal Stadium district killed 17 people and wounded at least 40. Residents said the facilities were used to house soldiers fighting an 18-month uprising against Assad.
“The army had taken over the neighbourhood and emptied it from residents. The hospital was turned into army barracks,” said activist Ahmad Saeed.
A woman living near the area said the casualty figure “appeared to be over 100”, judging from the number of ambulances ferrying the wounded and dead from the area.
The Noble Aleppo brigade of the Free Syrian Army said in a statement it carried out the Municipal Stadium district attack, killing or wounding 200 troops. It said the bombs were planted inside the buildings in co-operation with a loyalist sympathiser.
Syrian warplanes earlier bombed a residential district to the east after rebels overran army barracks there, killing and wounding dozens of people and exacerbating a water shortage in Syria's biggest city after a pipeline burst, activists said.
Assad has resorted increasingly to aerial bombardment to keep rebels fighting to overthrow him in check after they took control of residential neighbourhoods and made forays into the centre of Aleppo, Syria's commercial and industrial capital.
The uprising has polarised global powers, preventing effective international intervention, and is turning increasingly sectarian with the risk of spillover into adjacent Arab states with similar communal divisions.
Insurgent advances have forced Assad to deploy warplanes, major armoured forces and thousands of troops to prevent the fall of Aleppo, which would free up supply lines to the interior of Syria from Turkey where rebels have sheltered.
Decisive victory has eluded both sides, with rebels lacking heavy weapons needed to down aircraft and knock out artillery and Assad loath to send conscript troops of questionable loyalty into cities to re-establish dominance on the ground.
Instead, government forces have been bombarding population centres to try to turn residents against rebels dug in there, according to diplomats following the revolt.
Sunday's air raid destroyed a residential complex in the Hananu neighbourhood, one of several in eastern Aleppo under rebel control, opposition activists told Reuters by phone.
The death toll was at least five, including one woman, and bodies and wounded people were being dug out from the rubble. Video footage from the area showed scores of people searching and digging in the debris of a flattened building.
On-scene details could not be independently verified due to Syria's severe restrictions on international media access. - Reuters