IDLIB, Syria 

Regime shelling and Russian airstrikes killed 15 civilians in Syria’s Idlib, the White Helmets civil-defense agency said Thursday.  

Along with regime artillery barrages, Russian SU-34 warplanes struck central Idlib and its rural outskirts, leaving 15 dead, including eight children, the White Helmets said.

Regime attacks in Idlib’s de-escalation zone, in which acts of aggression are expressly prohibited, are believed to have killed at least 138 civilians since Jan. 1.

Last September, Ankara and Moscow agreed to turn Idlib into a demilitarized zone following a meeting in Russia's coastal city of Sochi between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

Syria has only just begun to emerge from a devastating conflict that began in 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on demonstrators with unexpected severity.

* Writing by Maimaitiming Yilixiati