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Syrian army announces 72-hour nationwide ceasefire

'Regime of silence' to be applied across all territory for three days of Eid festival, army says, as Assad makes rare appearance outside Damascus
Syrian children run during an activity in a rebel-held district on the outskirts of the capital Damascus (AFP)
The Syrian army said on Wednesday it would observe a 72-hour ceasefire across the country, in an announcement coinciding with the Eid festival marking the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.
 
"A 'regime of silence' will be applied across all territory of the Syrian Arab Republic for 72 hours from 1pm (1000 GMT) on 6 July," the army said in a statement republished by official media.

Meanwhile, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad joined Eid al-Fitr prayers at a mosque in third city Homs on Wednesday in a rare public appearance outside the capital.

Large parts of Homs were once under the control of rebels fighting to overthrow Assad's government, but since May 2014 they have been confined to a single besieged neighbourhood in the city's outskirts.

The al-Safa mosque, where Assad joined worshippers, is in Akrama, a loyalist neighbourhood which has been hit by repeated attacks by the Islamic State group and its rival al-Qaeda affiliate Nusra Front.

State television broadcast footage of the president in the congregation alongside Islamic Endowments Minister Mohammad Abdel-Sattar Sayyed and Syria's top Muslim cleric Ahmad Badredine Hassoun.

Since the civil war erupted in 2011, Assad has made only rare public appearances and nearly all of those have been in Damascus.

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