Aleppo hotel used as government base bombed

Reports are emerging that Syrian rebels have blown up a hotel used by President Bashar al-Assad's forces in Aleppo on Thursday, Reuters reports, citing state media and a monitoring group.

The rebels apparently detonated explosives in a tunnel underneath the Carlton Hotel, which is situated next to Aleppo's medieval citadel, Reuters said.

The Islamic Front, the largest alliance of rebel groups fighting against the Syrian government, took credit for the attack through a Tweet:

State television gave no word on any casualties from the attack that levelled the famed Carlton Citadel Hotel just across the road from the city's UNESCO-listed Citadel.

During the years just before the civil war, the area around the citadel saw major revitalisation projects, led by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, as tourism in the country boomed. Cafes just meters from the citadel were often crowded with visitors who wandered the maze of Aleppo's souk ahead of touring the fortress. The Carlton, renovated in a 19th century hospital building, was one of several brand new hotels constructed in Aleppo, the capital Damascus and other cities frequented by visitors at the height of the 2000s. 

It was not the first time that rebel sappers had tried to blow up the hotel, whose location and ultra-modern facilities made it one of the city's most sought after before the war.

They carried out a similar attempt in February but the building escaped major damage.

A rebel offensive in July 2012 in which they seized large swathes of Aleppo left the historic Citadel and nearby hotels which had once thronged with foreign tourists on the front line of the deadly conflict.