Syria : Medieval Aleppo souks destroyed by fire as battle rages

A fire rages at a medieval souk in Aleppo, Syria, in an image taken from Shaam News Network video. Photograph : Anonymous/AP

**

A huge fire has destroyed parts of the medieval souks in Aleppo, Syria, following raging battles between rebels and government troops.
The city is a Unesco world heritage site and the labyrinth of narrow alleys and shops was once a major tourist attraction and is one of Syria’s largest commercial hubs.
Over the past two months, the city, home to 2.5 million people, has become a focus of the insurgency against Bashar al-Assad’s regime, with near daily fighting and shelling.
Activists posted online videos which showed the fire around wooden doors and shops and a pall of smoke hanging over the city on Saturday.
Ahmad al-Halabi, an activist based in Aleppo, said residents were struggling to control the blaze with a limited number of fire extinguishers and low water supply : "It’s a disaster. The fire is threatening to spread to remaining shops," he said. "It is a very difficult and tragic situation there."
The souks of Aleppo, a maze of vaulted passageways with shops that sell everything from foods to fabrics, perfumes, spices and artisan souvenirs, are a tactical prize for the combatants. They lie beneath the city’s towering citadel where activists say regime troops and snipers have taken up positions.
Many of the shops have wooden doors, and clothes, fabrics and leather wares inside helped spread the fire, activists said.
Rebels and government troops have roughly controlled half of the city each since the offensive began in August.
The British-based activist group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has a network of activists across Syria, said Assad’s forces and rebels were blaming each other for the blaze. The observatory estimates that 30,000 people have died across the country since fighting began.
In awarding heritage status, Unesco said Aleppo’s "13th-century citadel, 12th-century Great Mosque and various 17th-century madrasas, palaces, caravanserais and hammams all form part of the city’s cohesive, unique urban fabric."
Aleppo’a souks are not the only Syrian cultural treasures to have fallen victim to the violence following the country’s uprising and the crackdown by the Assad regime.
Some of the country’s most significant sites, including centuries-old fortresses, have been caught in the crossfire in battles between regime forces and rebels. Others have been turned into military bases. In Homs, where up to 7,000 are estimated to have died, historic mosques and souk areas have also been smashed and artefacts stolen.
Rami Abdul-Rahman, who heads the Syrian Observatory, said it was not clear how the fire at the Aleppo market was started but also said a large part of the souks had been destroyed.