Nusra Front cuts off water supply to both halves of Aleppo

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May 11, 2014, The National

Residents of Syria’s second city Aleppo have been without water for a week because Islamist fighters have cut supplies into rebel and regime-held areas, a monitoring group said on Saturday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the Al Qaeda affiliate Al Nusra Front had cut water supplies from a pump distributing to both the rebel-held east and government-held west of Aleppo.

Last month, opposition forces cut the electricity supply to regime-controlled areas of Aleppo and the surrounding countryside.

But the director of the Observatory, Rami Abdel Rahman said, the groups were unable to cut off water supplies to regime areas without also affecting rebel-held neighbourhoods, calling the move “a crime”.

Once home to about 2.5 million residents and considered Syria’s economic powerhouse, Aleppo has been divided between government and opposition control since shortly after fighting there began in mid-2012.

At least one million people have been displaced from the city since then by fighting and relentless regime aerial bombardments of rebel areas.

Opposition forces also regularly shell regime-held parts of the city in the west.

The Observatory said the week of water cuts had forced residents to queue at wells to collect water, and the Britain-based group warned that some people were drinking unclean water, risking a spread of disease.

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