Projectiles from Syria kill 5 in SE Turkey

KILIS, Turkey

 Four refugee children were among five killed by rockets fired at a Turkish border town from Syria on Monday. 

A Syrian child died on Tuesday at Kilis State Hospital of heavy wounds received in Monday’s attack, according to a source speaking anonymously because he was not authorized to talk to the press.

The rockets, which injured six others, were the latest to hit Kilis, which lies less than 6 kilometers (4 miles) from Syrian territory controlled by Daesh. 

Kilis Governor Suleyman Tapsiz told reporters that the children were from the same family. The fourth fatality was identified as a 53-year-old Syrian shepherd. 

Speaking during a visit to the hospital where the casualties were being treated, Tapsiz said five of the injured are Syrian nationals and the other is a 13-year-old Turkish boy. 

One rocket hit the roof of a Yavuz Sultan Selim Foundation building housing refugee orphans in Kilis’ Hakverdi neighborhood, while another fell in a rural area close to a school in Yavuz Sultan Selim district. The school was evacuated for security reasons. 

Almost an hour before that incident, two other rockets hit an olive garden and the oxygen depot of Kilis State Hospital. 

Kilis province has been hit by a number of rockets fired from Syria in recent months. Four people were killed in January and March when rockets fired from Syria’s Bab region hit a school and a residential area. Last week, two civilians were killed by rocket fire.