Syria, Russia accuse rebels for Aleppo gas attack

BEIRUT, Nov 25 (Reuters): More than 100 people were wounded in a suspected toxic gas attack in Syria's Aleppo late on Saturday, which a health official said was the first such assault in the city.

The Syrian government and its ally Russia blamed the attack on insurgents, which rebel officials denied.

Russia's defense ministry said on Sunday its warplanes bombed militants who had fired chlorine gas at Aleppo.

Moscow said it would talk to Turkey, which backs some rebel factions and helped broker a ceasefire in the insurgent stronghold of Idlib.

A monitoring group said air strikes hit rebel territory in the northwest on Sunday for the first time since Russia and Turkey agreed a buffer zone there in September.

In Aleppo city which the government controls, the shells had spread a strong stench and caused breathing problems, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said.

State news agency SANA said on Sunday 107 people were injured, including children, after militants hit three districts with projectiles containing gases that caused choking.

It marks the highest such casualty toll in Aleppo since government forces and their allies clawed back the city from rebels nearly two years ago. "We can not know the kinds of gases but we suspected chlorine and treated patients on this basis because of the symptoms," Zaher Batal, the head of the Aleppo Doctors Syndicate, told Reuters.