Aid agencies evacuated hundreds of residents from the rebel-held district of Yarmouk in Damascus. Regime barrel bombs killed at least 23 people in Aleppo city, including eight Al Nusrah Front fighters. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham detonated two car bombs in Aleppo and clashed with Islamist battalions and rebels in the Al-Ra’ii area. The Al Nusrah Front and Islamic battalions took over several checkpoints from regime forces in Hama. The US denied Foreign Minister Mouallem’s accusation that it had sought direct negotiations with Syria at the Geneva II talks, and urged Russia and other nations to help pressure the regime to comply with the deadline for removal of its chemical weapons. An activist observer group claimed that over 136,000 people have died in the Syrian conflict so far, including 48,000 civilians, 32,936 regime soldiers, 21,128 rebel fighters, and 8,164 mainly non-Syrian fighters from ISIS, Al Nusrah, and Islamist battalions.
