Syria's rebel-held Idlib reels from deadly air attacks

Air strikes on the rebel-held Syrian city of Idlib on Tuesday killed 37 people, in some of the heaviest raids there in months, witnesses and rescue workers said.

The headquarters of Fateh al-Sham Front and the surrounding neighbourhood in Idlib city were battered by at least 10 strikes at dawn, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Observatory, which relies on a network of sources in Syria for its reports, said the death toll included 24 civilians, mostly women and children.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said the raids were probably carried out by Russian warplanes -- allied with Syria's government -- or by a US-backed air coalition.

However, Russia's defence ministry said media reports that its planes had bombed Idlib were not true, Interfax news agency reported.

Video footage by activists on social media showed civilians, including young children, being treated in a main city hospital where the injured had been rushed for treatment.

"We are still pulling bodies from the rubble," said Issam al-Idlibi, a volunteer civil defence worker.

The extent of the damage and the debris bore the hallmarks of a Russian attack, two witnesses said.

Russian planes have targeted a number of towns and villages in the area since entering the Syrian conflict in September 2015 to back ally President Bashar al-Assad.

But activists and residents also said there had been a reduction of Russian strikes in Idlib province since a Turkish-Russian brokered cessation of hostilities in late December.

Planes from the US-led coalition have also launched a number of attacks in the rural province, a major stronghold of militants, many of them formerly affiliated to al-Qaeda.

Idlib's population has been swollen by thousands of Syrian fighters and their families evacuated from villages and towns around Damascus and Aleppo city, which was retaken by the government in recent months.

Separately, at least four people were killed in air strikes by unknown jets in the town of Arbin in rebel-held Eastern Ghouta, northeast of the capital. The Syrian army and pro-government militias have been seeking in recent days to gain new ground there.

Meanwhile, the Syrian government and rebel groups swapped dozens of women prisoners and hostages, some of them with their children, in Hama province on Tuesday evening, the Observatory said..

Government representatives and rebels exchanged 112 people, including 24 children, in the rebel-held Qalaat al-Madiq town in rural Hama. Many had been detained for years.

About half the women were released from government prisons and then taken to opposition-held areas, the Observatory said.

In return, the others, along with three unidentified men, were set free by various rebel groups and shuttled to government-controlled areas along the coast.