Fighting continues in Aleppo after Syrian rebel breakthrough

Sporadic clashes hit the southern edges of Aleppo on Sunday morning hours after rebels said they had broken a three-week government siege of the Syrian city.

On Saturday, rebels said they had opened a new route into Aleppo's besieged eastern neighbourhoods, home to as many as 300,000 people.

But the road - which passes through southern edges of the city - remains too dangerous for civilians to use, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Sunday.

"There are intermittent clashes and air strikes, but to a lesser degree," said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman.

"Not a single civilian has left the eastern districts because the road is too dangerous and not secured," he told AFP.

Media activist Mohammed Halabi told The New Arab that nine civilians were killed in opposition-controlled Aleppo late on Saturday night following strikes from Russian aircraft. 

On Saturday, anti-regime groups overran a series of buildings in a military academy on the southwestern edges of Aleppo.

They then pushed northeast into the district of al-Ramouseh, linking up with rebel groups that had fought south from inside the city.

Rebels posted footage of their fighters embracing and celebrating the end of the government encirclement of Aleppo, in place since 17 July.

An AFP journalist in the eastern districts said a single truck of vegetables entered the neighbourhoods late Saturday to be sold in the markets the following day.

Syrian state media, however, denied that the siege had been broken and said the fight was ongoing.

"The terrorist groups are suffering huge losses and were not able to break the encirclement of the eastern neighbourhoods of Aleppo," a regime military source told state news agency SANA.

"The Syrian army in coordination with allied forces are continuing their fight south of Aleppo," it said.

The agency said 10 civilians were killed on Saturday in rebel shelling on two government-held districts.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 130 civilians have been killed since the opposition alliance launched its offensive on southern Aleppo on 31 July.

The monitor said more than 700 fighters from both sides had been killed in the onslaught, most of them rebels because of the regime's "aerial superiority".