At least 20 civilians, among them six members of the same family, were killed yesterday when government air strikes targeted several regions in northwestern Syria, a monitoring group said.
A further 18 people were injured during the air strikes, which started in the morning, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The warplanes targeted the villages of Talmenes, Bedama and Masaran in the rural southern part of Idlib province.
The Syrian government and their Russian ally have intensified their air strikes on southern Idlib during the past two days.
The heavy strikes led dozens of families to flee the area towards the Syrian-Turkish borders, say activists from Idlib.
Refugee camps near the border are already overcrowded with refugees from Idlib and many are living in dire conditions, according to the activists.
On April 30, the Syrian government, supported by Russian air power, began a massive military offensive against rebels in the provinces of Hama and Idlib, forcing thousands of people to flee.
The Syrian government forces have since regained territory from the rebels in the two provinces. Idlib is mainly controlled by the Al Qaeda-affiliated Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
ERDOGAN’S APPEAL 
TO RESETTLE REFUGEES
Meanwhile, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan urged world powers yesterday to help it resettle 1mn Syrian refugees very soon, accusing governments of moving more quickly to guard Syria’s oil fields than its children. Erdogan, whose country hosts 3.7mn Syrian refugees, the largest refugee population worldwide, said more than 600,000 should voluntarily join around 371,000 already in a “peace zone” in northern Syria from which Turkey drove Kurdish militia.
 “I think the resettlement can easily reach 1mn in a very short period of time,” Erdogan told the Global Forum on Refugees in Geneva. The plan met with scepticism from Jan Egeland, Secretary-General of the Norwegian Refugee Council, who said that while Turkey was far ahead in terms of hosting refugees, resettling Arab refugees in areas previously populated by Kurds was wrong.
 “I hope this will not happen, really. It shouldn’t happen,” Egeland told Reuters.
 Turkey has said it expected the Syrian Kurdish refugees it hosts, who number around 300,000, to be the first to return to the area between the border towns of Ras Al Ain and Tel Abyad.
 Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said returns must be voluntary, refugees should be given support and property and other legal issues must be addressed.
 “We are also urging the Syrian authorities to allow us a presence in the areas where people return because this could be a confidence-building measure,” Grandi told a news conference.
 Erdogan said Turkey had spent more than $40bn hosting the refugees and criticised the European Union, which had pledged nearly 6bn euros ($6.61bn), for failing to deliver around half of that sum. The European Commission has said it is committed to delivering the aid.
 Two months ago, Turkey and its Syrian rebel allies launched a third cross-border offensive into northern Syria against the YPG, which had spearheaded the fight against Islamic State.
 After seizing a 120km strip of land from Ras Al Ain to Tel Abyad in northeastern Syria, Ankara signed deals with Washington and Moscow to halt its assault.
Erdogan said: “Unfortunately the efforts that were spared to protect the oil fields were not mobilised for the safety and security of the children in Syria.”
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