A man prays in the former rebel-held town of Harasta in Eastern Ghouta on March 28, 2018, prior to being evacuated to Syria's central Hama province following an evacuation deal with rebel fighters and Russia, an ally of the Syrian President. (Source: AFP)
Russia's defence ministry said Friday an agreement had been reached on armed rebel groups leaving the main town in Syria's Eastern Ghouta.
"Today an agreement has been reached with the leaders of illegal armed formations of fighters and their family members to leave the town of Douma shortly," a senior defence ministry official, Sergei Rudskoi, said at a briefing, quoted on the defence ministry website.
Syrian regime ally Russia has played a crucial role in helping the government gain the upper hand against rebels being evacuated from Eastern Ghouta.
Moscow's military personnel have also directly overseen evacuations of rebels and civilians from encircled opposition zones in the enclave.
Rudskoi said that so far "28,495 peaceful civilians have left via a humanitarian corridor opened in the area of the Al-Wafideen settlement."
Syrian troops and their allies launched their all-out assault on Eastern Ghouta on February 18, seeking to oust the armed opposition from its strategic perch on the edge of the capital.
More than 1,600 civilians have been killed in the assault, and tens of thousands of people have fled.
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