DAMASCUS, Jan. 16 (Xinhua) -- The Syrian army said on Thursday that rebel groups have intensified their shelling on the residential areas in Aleppo city.
Scores of civilians have been killed and wounded by the repeated shelling, the army said in a statement quoted by the state news agency SANA.
It added that the rebels were also firing on the humanitarian corridors established by Russia and Syria for the civilians who desire to leave the rebel-held areas in Aleppo province and the nearby Idlib province, the last major rebel stronghold.
The statement said the Syrian army's targeted the rebel positions as part of the retaliation against the rebels' shelling against civilian areas.
The army will exert all efforts to secure the evacuation of the civilians from the rebel-held areas, said the statement.
Aleppo, recaptured by the Syrian army in 2016, has largely remained safe except for occasional mortar shelling by the rebels.
The radical rebels, located in the western and northern countryside of Aleppo, frequently fire mortar shells at the city and other government-controlled areas.
