Staffan de Mistura

Rebel fighters launched an assault in Syria's divided northern city of Aleppo on May 3 and fired rockets on a hospital in the latest violence to hit civilians as diplomats struggled to restore an unravelling ceasefire and resurrect peace talks. 

Fresh air strikes pounded Syria's Aleppo city early May 2, an AFP correspondent said, as US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Geneva in a bid to halt the mounting carnage.
 
More than a week of fighting in and around Syria's second city has killed hundreds of civilians.    

Russia said on May 1 that talks were taking place to include Aleppo in a temporary lull in fighting declared by the Syrian army in some western parts of the country, a sign of intensified efforts to halt a surge of violence in its former commercial capital.

At least 20 people were killed, including three children and two doctors,  in the Syrian city of Aleppo, Thursday, during air strikes by Syrian fighter jets. The UN described the situation in the city as ‘disastrous’. The Syrian air force bombed civilian houses including a hospital where members from the organisation ‘Doctors Without Borders’ were working at.

The Syrian government's chief negotiator said on April 25 that an explosion south of the capital had struck a hospital, killing some patients evacuated last week from two rebel-besieged towns in the northwestern province of Idlib. 

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini has expressed her concern about reports of "new Syrian regime offensives near Aleppo and east of Damascus." 

"The EU strongly supports the U.N. efforts to resume Syrian talks and push for the political transition for the sake of Syrians, the region and the world," Mogherini said in a statement.

United Nations Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura has said he used a meeting with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem on April 11 to urge Damascus to support Syria's shaky truce and allow more humanitarian aid access. 

U.N. special envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura said April 7 that the next round of Syria peace talks will begin on April 13 after he completes a diplomatic tour, including stops in Damascus and Tehran, a push back from the formerly announced date of April 11.  

In a brazen assault near the Syrian capital, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants on April 7 abducted 300 cement workers and contractors in an area northeast of Damascus, Syrian state TV reported as fighting elsewhere in the country also worsened.
     

The Syrian army's successes and its strong support from Russia will help accelerate a political settlement to the country's civil war, President Bashar al-Assad said, as the two allies maintained an offensive against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants.