(CNN) — Two hospitals and a school building in northern Syria were struck Monday morning, leaving at least 24 people dead and eight missing, according to reports.
Fifteen people were killed when a hospital and a school building that was housing displaced people were struck in Azaz, in Syria’s Aleppo province, according to a hospital worker on the scene. Up to 40 other people were wounded.
A hospital employee known as Moudhar told CNN that staff members were evacuating the wounded after the first strike on the Women and Children’s Hospital when the complex and a road leading to the Turkish border were struck again. Women and children were among the dead, he said.
Another projectile hit a nearby school building housing displaced people, he added.
It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the strikes.
Speaking in Kiev, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu blamed Russia for the strikes in Azaz, which is close to the Turkish border, claiming Moscow had targeted the complex with ballistic missiles fired from the Caspian Sea.
Moscow did not immediately respond to the accusation.
Nine dead, eight missing in Idlib
In a separate attack, a hospital supported by Doctors Without Borders at Maarat al-Numan in Syria’s Idlib province was destroyed after being struck four times within minutes, the medical humanitarian organization said.
Nine people were killed and eight others were missing after the attack, Mego Terzian, president of Doctors Without Borders France, told French television Monday.
Maarat al-Numan is about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Azaz.
“This appears to be a deliberate attack on a health structure, and we condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms,” said Massimiliano Rebaudengo, Doctors Without Borders’ head of mission.
“The destruction of the hospital leaves the local population of around 40,000 people without access to medical services in an active zone of conflict,” he said.
The 30-bed hospital had 54 staff members, two operating areas, an outpatient department and an emergency room.
Airstrikes earlier this month killed three people and wounded at least six at a Doctors Without Borders-supported hospital in Daraa governorate, southern Syria, on February 5, the aid group said.
Chaos in northern Syria
Northern Syria has been the scene of intense fighting recently, with Syrian regime forces, backed by Russian air power, pursuing a major offensive on the key city Aleppo, and
Turkey bombarding Kurdish People’s Protection Units, or YPG, near Azaz over the weekend.
Turkey said it was a response to shelling from YPG positions. Turkish Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz said Sunday that his country had no intention of sending ground troops into Syria, amid international concern about Ankara’s actions.
The United States and France called on Ankara to halt the bombardment, which killed two Kurdish fighters and wounded seven others, according to a London-based monitoring group, and Syria complained to the U.N. Security Council about the Turkish shelling.
Turkey considers the YPG a terrorist group, while the United States backs it in the fight against ISIS.
Western powers have also been critical of Russia’s actions in Syria, saying it was undermining the prospects of implementing a recently agreed upon cessation of hostilities by bombing civilians. Moscow denies the allegations.
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