Syrian troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad thrust into a battered rebel stronghold in the northern city of Aleppo on Wednesday, August 8, forcing defenders to fall back in fierce fighting.

The intensity of the conflict in Syria’s biggest city and elsewhere suggests that Assad remains determined to cling to power, Reuters reported.

Syrian state television said government forces had pushed into Salaheddine, killing most of the «terrorists» there, and had entered other parts of the city in a fresh offensive.

Joma Abu Ahmed, an activist with the rebel Free Syrian Army, told that insurgents had fallen back to the nearby neighbourhood of Saif al-Dawla, which was now under fire from army tanks inside Salaheddine and from combat jets.

Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said fighting in the area was the most violent since insurgents first moved in.

Free Syrian Army denied possibility of retreating.

As Assad’s forces battle for Aleppo, there has been no let-up in fighting elsewhere in Syria. More than 240 people were killed across the country on Tuesday, 40 of them in the central city of Homs, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

«Amnesty is concerned that the deployment of heavy weaponry in residential areas in and around Aleppo will lead to further human rights abuses and grave breaches of international law,» the human rights group Amnesty International said, adding that both sides might be held criminally accountable for failing to protect civilians.

The violence in Syria has forced tens of thousands of people to flee into neighbouring countries, and about 2,400 refugees, including two generals, arrived in Turkey overnight. Before the latest influx, Turkey said it was sheltering 47,500 Syrians fleeing a conflict which opposition sources say has cost at least 18,000 people since it began in March 2011.

Ref.110.110.110.1542