Russia-sponsored Syrian cease-fire talks taking place Wednesday and Thursday in Astana, Kazakhstan will include a U.S. State Department envoy attending as an observer.

The move was confirmed Tuesday in a White House statement that followed talks between President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

Tuesday's call, described by the White House as "a very good one," is believed to be the first direct contact between the two leaders since U.S. warships targeted a Syrian military airbase -- used by both Syrian forces and their Russian allies -- with dozens of cruise missiles on April 4.

Trump directly linked the U.S. missile strike, which triggered an angry Kremlin response, to Syria's use of chemical weaponry in an attack that killed nearly 100 civilians days earlier.

Tuesday's White House statement said the two leaders also discussed the development of safe zones "to achieve lasting peace for humanitarian and many other reasons."

Under the previous administration of President Barack Obama, the U.S. was cool to the idea of setting up a safe zone, pointing to the complexity and manpower involved in protecting such an area.

But proponents say a safe zone inside of Syria would lessen the burden on other countries in the region that currently host more than 5 million refugees.

As the Astana talks began, a large explosion in northern Syria killed at least five people and wounded others.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the blast in the rebel-held town of Azaz came from a car bomb.

Azaz has long been an important area for rebels who oppose President Bashar al-Assad, serving as a key supply route as well as a hub for fighters and opposition activists.

Several previous attacks in Azaz have been claimed by the Islamic State group, but there was no immediate claim for Wednesday's attack.

On Tuesday, the Observatory reported a surprise attack by Islamic State militants on a United Nations-funded refugee camp near the Syria-Iraq border that killed at least 32 civilians and wounded at least 20 others.

Kurdish and Syrian sources said many of the victims were holed up in the makeshift camp after fleeing fighting in areas of Syria and Iraq controlled by extremist forces.

The Observatory also reported heavy fighting between Kurdish fighters and extremists in the aftermath of the attack, and later said the U.S.-backed Kurdish and Syrian Arab Syrian Defense Forces (SDF) had regained control of the area in al-Hasakah province.

Separately Tuesday in the nearby Euphrates River city of Tabqa, monitors reported the deaths of more than 35 Islamic State fighters battling the SDF in a last-ditch attempt to prevent anti-jihadist forces from gaining full control of the city.

SDF forces and their nominal Syrian Arab allies in northern Syria have been pushing eastward through the Euphrates River valley for months in a protracted offensive aimed at confronting Islamic State in its de facto capital, Raqqa.

The anti-jihadist forces are expected to launch coordinated attacks on the IS stronghold city later this year.

Separately Tuesday near Damascus, the International Committee of the Red Cross said an aid convoy of food and medical supplies reached the besieged town of Douma for the first time since October.

An ICRC tweet late Tuesday said the convoy had entered the town northeast of Damascus under the cover of darkness, with 51 trucks carrying emergency supplies for 35,000 people.

Rebel-held Douma has been under government siege for nearly four years.</s>Image copyright AFP Image caption People injured in the attack were taken to hospitals in the provincial capital of Hassakeh

More than 30 civilians and Kurdish-led fighters have been killed in an attack by Islamic State (IS) militants near Syria's north-eastern border with Iraq.

They targeted a makeshift camp for displaced Syrians and Iraqi refugees at Rajm al-Salibi, near the town of Shaddadi in Hassakeh province.

The militants also clashed with members of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) stationed at a nearby checkpoint.

IS said the attack was one of several targeting "apostates" around Shaddadi.

The jihadist group is coming under mounting pressure in northern Syria from the SDF's Kurdish and Arab fighters, who are supported by the US, and from pro-government forces in neighbouring Iraq.

The SDF has driven IS militants out of much of Hassakeh and is close to taking control of the strategically important Euphrates River Valley town of Tabqa.

It will soon launch an offensive to retake the city of Raqqa, the de facto capital of the "caliphate" proclaimed by IS after the fall of the Iraqi city of Mosul in 2014.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, reports that at least five IS suicide bombers blew themselves up outside and inside the camp at Rajm al-Salibi, east of Shaddadi, at dawn on Tuesday.

At least 38 people were killed by the bombings and subsequent clashes, among them 23 civilians, and 30 other people were wounded, it adds.

According to Syria's official Sana news agency, more than 30 civilians were killed and 34 wounded. It did not say whether there had been any suicide bombings.

The Kurdish Red Crescent put the civilian death toll at 22.

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SDF fighters took wounded civilians to hospitals in the city of Hassakeh. Several were admitted to intensive care due to the severity of their injuries, according to medical sources cited by Sana.

An IS statement said six groups of militants had attacked SDF positions in Shaddadi and its surrounding area on Tuesday, including a "barracks" near Rajm al-Salibi, killing and wounding dozens of people.

An Iraqi army source told the BBC the militants had also abducted dozens of civilians during the attack on the camp.

It was not possible to verify the report. However, a similar allegation was made by the head of the Iraqi parliament's human rights committee in an interview with Beirut-based al-Mayadeen TV and Sana cited some of those injured as saying they had lost contact with dozens of their relatives.

Image copyright AFP Image caption There are several camps for refugees and displaced people along Syria's border with Iraq

About 300 families were waiting at Rajm al-Salibi - where conditions are harsh and there is little shelter - to be screened and allowed to enter SDF territory.

They included Syrians from Raqqa and Deir al-Zour provinces, as well as some of the thousands of Iraqis who have fled to Syria from Mosul since October.

As a result of the attack, approximately 400 people are being relocated from Rajm al-Salibi to another camp at al-Hol.</s>A bomb blast killed at least four people and wounded many more in a rebel-held town in northern Syria near the Turkish border on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.

BEIRUT: A bomb blast killed at least four people and wounded many more in a rebel-held town in northern Syria near the Turkish border on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.

The explosion hit the town of Azaz, which has long been an important base for rebels, including groups backed by Turkey.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast, which the British-based Observatory said was likely from a car bomb.</s>Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Sunday his country may take further action against Kurdish militants in Iraq and Syria, as U.S.-backed forces in Syria closed in on the last neighborhoods of a former stronghold of the Islamic State group.

The U.S. views the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces as the most effective partner to counter the Islamic State group in northern Syria, an assessment bolstered by the SDF’s steady advances against the jihadists. But it has complicated relations with Turkey, which views the group’s Kurdish component as an extension of a terror group operating inside its own borders.

In Istanbul, Erdogan insisted that U.S. support for such groups “must come to an end,” and said he would bring up the matter at a meeting with President Donald Trump next month.

The SDF, which include Arab fighters, seized six neighborhoods from IS militants in Tabqa on Sunday, according to the affiliated Hawar news agency.

Tabqa is 40 kilometers (25 miles) southeast of the Islamic State group’s de facto capital Raqqa and an important stronghold for the militants. It lies next to the Tabqa Dam, one of several controlling the flow of the Euphrates River.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said the SDF’s control of Tabqa was “practically total.”

A U.S. air lift of artillery and special forces advisers to place them behind IS lines in March was a turning point in the Tabqa offensive and underscored the closeness between Washington and the SDF.

Turkey, however, has remained hostile to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, known by their Kurdish acronym the YPG, which form the backbone of the SDF. The YPG are close to the Kurdish PKK insurgent group in Turkey, which is designated as a terror organization by NATO and the U.S.

Last week, Turkey struck at YPG positions inside Syria, killing 20 fighters and media activists, according to the group, prompting Kurdish parties to call for a U.S.-enforced no-fly-zone over northern Syria.

U.S. troops were seen Saturday in armored vehicles in Syria in Kurdish areas in a show of force apparently intended to dissuade Turkey and Syrian Kurdish forces from attacking one another. Kurdish officials describe the U.S. troop movement as “buffer” between them and Turkey.

Video from northern Syria showed the U.S. patrols parked alongside Kurdish units flying the YPG flag.

“We will be forced to continue (our offensives),” Erdogan said. “We won’t provide a date and time for when we’ll come. But they will know that the Turkish military can come.”

Erdogan is due in Washington on May 16 for his first meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump.

The YPG is distrusted by Turkish-backed anti-government forces in Syria, who say the group is an ally of President Bashar Assad’s government. The YPG and Syrian government forces have largely avoided confrontation over the course of the country’s six-year-long civil war.

Other Kurdish parties accuse the YPG’s political arm, the PYD, of squelching dissent and embracing authoritarianism.

In other developments, more than a thousand residents of Damascus suburbs demonstrated against anti-government rebel infighting, activists said, only to be met at one demonstration by rebels who tried to disperse the protest with gunfire.

Videos from the Arbin suburb showed demonstrators scrambling for cover after gunmen dressed in military fatigues lined up in front of the march and fired, largely into the air.

Seven protesters were wounded, according to the activist-run Ghouta Media Center, which posted the video. The Observatory said 12 people were wounded.

Demonstrators blamed the powerful Army of Islam group for trying to suppress the march.

The infighting pits the Army of Islam against the al-Rahman Corps and al-Qaida-linked group the Levant Liberation Committee, or Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. Each side blames the other for triggering the fighting in the power struggle over control of eastern Ghouta.

The area, which includes Arbin, has been held under siege by government forces for more than three years. Residents depend on smuggling and local farming for food.

“My friend, the mujahid. You are responsible for our struggle. You are not a mercenary. Do not point your gun at your people,” one of the signs held by demonstrators announced. “The struggle is the path to heaven. Beware of the path to hell.”

In 48 hours of fighting, the Observatory said at least 87 insurgents from the warring sides were killed. Eight civilians were also killed in the fighting.</s>At least 32 people were killed on Tuesday in an Islamic State group attack near a refugee camp on the Syrian side of the border with Iraq, a monitor said.

"At least five suicide attackers blew themselves up outside and inside a camp for Iraqi refugees and displaced Syrians in Hasakeh province," Syrian Observatory for Human Rights chief Rami Abdel Rahman said.

Heavy clashes then erupted between the IS fighters and members of the Syrian Democratic Forces, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, some of whose combatants were among the dead, Abdel Rahman told AFP.

The camp lies in the Rajm al-Salibeh area just inside Syrian territory, and at least 21 of the dead were displaced Syrians or Iraqi refugees, the Observatory said.

"At least 30 people were wounded, and the death toll may rise because some people are in critical condition and others are still unaccounted for," the Britain-based monitor said.

The US-backed SDF has captured swathes of northern Syria from IS, and in recent days overran most of the strategic Euphrates Valley town of Tabqa.

The battle for Tabqa is an important part of a broader offensive for IS's main Syrian stronghold, Raqa, downstream.</s>At least 21 civilians were killed Tuesday in a surprise Islamic State attack near a refugee camp on the Syrian side of the border with Iraq, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Spokesman Rami Abdel said, "At least five suicide attackers blew themselves up outside and inside the camp for Iraqi refugees and displaced Syrians."

Kurdish and Syrian sources said many of the victims were residing in the temporary camp after fleeing fighting in areas of Syria and Iraq controlled by IS.

Heavy fighting erupted after the attack between IS militants, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, killing some of the combatants.

The U.S.-supported SDF has taken areas in northern Syria from IS. SDF most recently captured most of the strategic town of Tabqa in the Euphrates Valley.

Tabqa is an important IS stronghold. It is about 40 kilometers southeast of Raqqa.

In Iraq, the IS group is fighting for its survival against Iraqi forces and their allies in the neighborhoods it still controls in the western part of Mosul, Iraq's second largest city.</s>Syria war: Many dead in IS attack on displaced people’s camp

More than 30 civilians and Kurdish-led fighters have been killed in an attack by Islamic State militants near Syria’s north-eastern border with Iraq.

They targeted a makeshift camp for displaced Syrians and Iraqi refugees at Rajm al-Salibi, near the town of Shaddadi in Hassakeh province.

The militants also also clashed with members of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) stationed at a nearby checkpoint.

The US-backed alliance is spearheading the battle against IS in eastern Syria.

Its Kurdish and Arab fighters are close to taking control of the strategically important Euphrates River Valley town of Tabqa and will soon launch an offensive to retake the de facto IS capital of Raqqa.

At least five IS suicide bombers blew themselves up outside and inside the camp at Rajm al-Salibi, south-east of the town of Shaddadi, at dawn on Tuesday, the Syrian Observatory, a UK-based monitoring group, reports.

At least 32 people were killed by the bombings and subsequent clashes, among them 21 civilians, and 30 other people were wounded, it adds.

According to Syria’s official Sana news agency, more than 30 civilians were killed and 34 wounded. It did not say whether there had been any suicide bombings.

The Kurdish Red Crescent put the civilian death toll at 22.

SDF fighters took wounded civilians to hospitals in the city of Hassakeh. Several were admitted to intensive care due to the severity of their injuries, according to medical sources cited by Sana.

The militants also abducted dozens of civilians during the attack, an Iraqi army source told the BBC.

It was not possible to verify the report. However, a similar allegation was made by the head of the Iraqi parliament’s human rights committee in an interview with Beirut-based al-Mayadeen TV and Sana cited some of those injured as saying they had lost contact with dozens of their relatives.

They included Syrians from Raqqa and Deir al-Zour provinces, as well as Iraqis who had fled the second city of Mosul, Sana reports.</s>Civilians and SDF members killed after five suicide bombers detonate explosives in Hasaka province, monitor says.

At least 37 people, including dozens of civilians, have been killed in an attack by ISIL suicide bombers targeting an area in northeast Syria held by US-backed Kurdish forces, according to a monitoring group.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said five suicide bombers detonated explosives in Rajm al-Salib, the location of a checkpoint and refugee camp in Hasaka province near the border with Iraq.

The explosions on Tuesday were followed by gun battles between other ISIL attackers and Kurdish fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) who were manning the area, leaving dozens of people wounded.

"The area where the attacks took place is where many refugees escaping violence in Iraq were gathering," Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of Observatory, told the DPA news agency, adding that the attackers might have come from Iraq.

The Observatory monitors Syria's conflict via a network of contacts on the ground.

Nasser Haj Mansour, an adviser to the SDF, confirmed to the Reuters news agency that several civilian casualties included people who fled ISIL from Syria's Deir Az Zor and Iraq.

ISIL, which stands for Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and is also known as ISIS, said via its Amaq website that a group of 16 fighters had launched an attack on Kurdish checkpoints, killing and wounding dozens.

It said some ISIL fighters carried out four attacks inside al-Shadadi city which mainly targeted military posts, while others carried out attacks inside Hariri village and a sixth squad hit the barracks at Rajm al-Salibi.

The attacks came as Kurdish fighters backed by the US-led, anti-ISIL coalition continued their mission in the town of Tabqa, which sits on a strategic supply route about 55km west of Raqqa, the de facto capital of ISIL in Syria.

"After taking the old city, we now control around 90 percent of Tabqa ... we advanced against the ISIL and pushed further to the other parts of the city," Jihan Sheikh, of the Ghadab al-Furat, a Kurdish group fighting under the SDF, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday.

The SDF, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias, has seized large swathes of northern Syria from ISIL in a campaign to drive the group out of Raqqa.</s>“It was three in the morning when Daesh came and started to shoot at people,” said Abdulah Khalef Hamid, an Iraqi refugee from Mosul, who said his mother-in-law was killed in Tuesday’s attack. “I was wounded and they thought I was dead so they left me. We were around 200 families, they left at sunrise,” he added.

The International Rescue Committee said thousands of people from the Iraqi city of Mosul have travelled west to the Sleibi crossing since October, often via smugglers. In a statement, it said several children were among the dead and wounded.

The militants struck before dawn after sneaking into the village of Rajm Sleibi, located along a front line that separates the Kurdish-controlled Hassakeh province from Daesh-held areas further south. Some militants reportedly blew themselves up at a Kurdish checkpoint while others attacked sleeping civilians in a nearby temporary camp sheltering hundreds of displaced people who fled Daesh-controlled territory.

BEIRUT—Daesh militants staged a surprise attack early Tuesday at a crossing frequently used by Iraqi and Syrian civilians seeking safety in northeastern Syria, killing at least 37 people, mostly civilians, Kurdish officials and activists said.

Redur Khalil, a spokesman for the main Kurdish fighting force in Syria, said the attack started with an early morning assault by Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL, militants on a checkpoint in Sleibi belonging to the Syrian Democratic Forces, a U.S.-backed and Kurdish-dominated force that fights Daesh.

The militants then “committed a massacre” against civilians as they sought to enter SDF-controlled territory, Khalil said.

He told The Associated Press the attack came a few hours after Daesh suicide bombers dressed in civilian clothes sneaked into the town of Shaddadeh and attacked SDF forces, triggering clashes that were ongoing.

Survivors from the attack on the camp said the militants arrived in four cars before shooting several people and kidnapping others.

“They were shouting ‘You are infidels and you are going toward the infidels,’” said Fatima, a displaced Syrian woman who asked that her last name not be used, fearing retribution. “They shot at the checkpoint and at the civilians there, and they dragged the youngsters and put them in the cars and drove them away,” she said.

Issam Amin, a media activist in Hassakeh, said the victims arriving at the city’s hospitals had stabbing and gunshot wounds.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks the Syrian conflict through activists on the ground, said Tuesday’s attack included suicide bombers and heavy clashes with the SDF. The Observatory put the death toll at 38, including 23 civilians, many of them Iraqi. Hawar, a news agency for the semi-autonomous Kurdish areas in Syria, put the death toll at 37.

Daesh is under attack by an array of forces in Syria and Iraq.

In Syria, the SDF is now fighting to recapture the town of Tabqa, an important militant stronghold located about 40 kilometres southeast of the Daesh’s de facto capital, Raqqa. Kurdish officials said Kurdish-led opposition fighters have pushed the extremists almost completely out of Tabqa and were cleaning up the town. They said Daesh continues to hold the nearby dam on the Euphrates River.

In Iraq, the extremist group is fighting for survival against Iraqi forces and their allies in the last neighbourhoods it still holds in the western part of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city.

Daesh claimed responsibility for Tuesday’s attacks through its Aamaq media arm, saying its fighters attacked four Kurdish positions in the southern countryside of Hassakeh province.

Rajm Sleibi lies about 30 kilometres south of the town of al-Hol, which houses a large refugee camp for civilians displaced from Syria and Iraq. A Kurdish activist said it is the entry point to Hassakeh for Syrians civilians fleeing the eastern cities of Deir el-Zour and Raqqa, and those fleeing from Mosul and elsewhere in Iraq. The civilians spend about two weeks in Rajm Sleibi while they get security clearance from Kurdish authorities, and are then taken to al-Hol.

The activist spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing for his safety.

The camp is within the zone of influence of the SDF but not directly protected by its forces.

Elsewhere in Syria, opposition activists said Daesh killed 10 of its own after accusing them of selling weapons to arms traders. The activists said the killings took place in the Mayadeen area in eastern Syria, near the Iraqi border.

The Observatory and Omar Abu Laila, a Europe-based activist with contacts in the area, said the men were all Iraqis and were shot dead Monday in a main street in front of dozens of onlookers.</s>A Syria monitoring group says an attack by Islamic State (IS) militants near a refugee camp in northeastern Syria killed at least 24 people.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said more than 30 people also were wounded in the May 2 attack, which targeted a checkpoint at Rajm al-Salibi, the location of a refugee camp near the border between Syria and Iraq.

The predawn attack was in territory controlled by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Monitors say IS fighters sneaked into the village of Rajm al-Salibi, located along a front line that separates the Kurdish-controlled Hasakeh Province and IS-held areas further south.

The SDF, a coalition of Kurdish and Arab militias, has seized large swaths of northern Syria from IS during the past year, and is now waging a campaign to drive the extremist group from its de facto capital of Raqqa, Syria.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AP
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, at least 38 people are killed, including civilians and Syrian Democratic Forces fighters, after ISIL militants attack a camp for displaced Syrian and Iraqi refugees near Al-Shaddadah, Al-Hasakah Governorate.