Syria government seizes two towns in Ghouta; 30 civilians killed: Monitor

Syria's government retook two more towns in Eastern Ghouta on Saturday, a war monitor said, pressing an offensive to capture the rebel enclave on the doorstep of Damascus.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said air strikes on a rebel pocket in Eastern Ghouta killed 30 people gathering to flee to government lines.

The UK-based war monitoring group said the strikes on Zamalka town also wounded dozens. There was no immediate comment from Damascus, which says it only targets armed militants.

Government forces seized Kafr Batna and Sabqa in the south of the enclave, the Observatory said, as thousands of civilians fled into government-held territory.

Russia-backed government forces have retaken more than 80 percent of the last opposition bastion outside the capital since launching a blistering air and ground offensive on 18 February, the Observatory says.

The assault has split opposition-held areas into three shrinking pockets, each held by different rebels.

The southern pocket is held by the Faylaq al-Rahman rebel group, which the Observatory says counts some 8,000 fighters in its ranks.

After Saturday's advance, the group now controls just a handful of areas, the monitor says: Arbin - the largest - as well as Zamalka, Hazeh, Ain Tarma and parts of the Damascus neighbourhood of Jobar.

Civilians leaving

Thousands of civilians streaming out of the enclave into government-held areas on Saturday came mostly from this southern sector, it said.

The Observatory said a new wave of 10,000 people had left the insurgent pocket to army positions on Saturday.

On Friday, the enclave's main rebel groups - Faylaq al-Rahman, Jaish al-Islam and Ahrar al-Sham - said they would be willing to hold direct UN-sponsored talks with government-backer Russia on a ceasefire.

More than 1,400 civilians have been killed since the government offensive began, the Observatory says, while tens of thousands more have fled.

Jaish al-Islam controls an area around the main town of Douma in the north of the former enclave, while Ahrar al-Sham holds influence in the area of the town of Harasta to the west.