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DAMASCUS, Feb. 17-- Following years of blind mortar shelling on its residential areas, Syrian northern city Aleppo has become safe from shelling after a wide-scale military operation. After its liberation in 2016, the provincial capital of Aleppo remained subject to mortar shelling by the rebels in the western and northwestern countryside of Aleppo, which claimed the lives of many people whose number is yet unknown. Over the past two months, the Russian-backed Syrian army launched a wide-scale offensive in the countryside of Aleppo province and the countryside of the nearby Idlib province in northwestern Syria. The army captured key areas in the countryside of Idlib but most notably managed to secure much of the northwestern and western countryside of Aleppo, securing thus the vicinity of the provincial capital of Aleppo, and also opening the Damascus-Aleppo highway that has been cut off by the rebels in Idlib and Aleppo since 2017. The Syrian army released a statement on Monday, saying that dozens of villages and towns returned under government control as a result of the current military operation. The military operation in western Aleppo was "precise and qualitative," adding that the operation is ongoing, said the statement. A military officer in the Lairamoun area in western Aleppo told Xinhua that the aim of the current military operation is to secure Aleppo from shelling and to open the road connecting areas in the northwestern countryside of Aleppo, namely the towns of Nubbul and Zahra, with Aleppo city. | 
