DHAKA: New aerial bombardment from explosives-packed barrel bombs in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo killed at least 20 people on Saturday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, reports The Straits Times.

The raids came as in the oil-rich east, the Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front and allied Islamist rebel groups launched a new offensive against the jihadist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The Observatory said 20 people including two children were killed in separate barrel bomb attacks on Aleppo’s eastern rebel-held neighbourhoods.

Hundreds of people have been killed in several waves of barrel bomb assaults, each lasting several days, since December 15, the Britain-based group says.

BDST: 2103 HRS, FEB 08, 2014