Nine children were among 10 people said to have been killed by Turkish shelling near a school in the Kurdish-controlled northern Syrian town of Tal Rifaat, according to a human rights watchdog.
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that along with the 10 killed, 21 were said to have been injured by the shelling and fighting the Aleppo province town, which lies about 15 miles south of the Turkish border.
The observatory reports that those killed in Tal Rifaat were citizens displaced from the Afrin region last year when Turkish-backed forces carried out Operation Olive Branch and clashed with predominantly Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces.
Tal Rifaat is one of a number of Kurdish-controlled areas near the Turkish border that has come under attack as part of Turkey’s Operation Peace Spring. The operation began in October and seeks to push out Kurdish “terrorists” militias and create a “safe zone” along Turkey’s border with Syria.
Reports of the children’s death at the hands of forces backed by a NATO member drew a response from the United Nations Children’s Fund.
“We are shocked and saddened at reports that eight children were killed and another eight were injured in attacks today on Tal Rifaat town, northern Aleppo. All of them were under the age of 15,” Ted Chaiban, UNICEF regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement.