DAMASCUS (Dispatches) – The all-Syria ceasefire, brokered by Russia and Turkey, is holding across the country despite initial instances of violations by foreign-backed terrorists, a monitoring group and militant sources say.
According to the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, clashes took place on Friday after terrorists took over a position in Hama province.
Government forces responded to the attack, shelling terrorist positions in Atshan and Skeik villages in Idlib province, which borders Hama, the London-based group said.
The clashes came less than two hours after the ceasefire took effect on Friday but a member of the Jaish al-Nasr terrorist group was quoted as saying that the skirmishes had stopped.
The ceasefire agreement excludes the most brutal of terror outfits operating in Syria, namely Daesh and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, formerly known as al-Nusra Front.
The truce was mediated by Moscow and Ankara, which were respectively representing the Syrian government and the anti-Damascus terrorists.

‘War Drags on Due to Foreign Aid for Terrorists’

President Bashar al-Assad says the crisis in Syria is mainly rooted in foreign support for extremist groups inspired by Wahhabism, a Takfiri ideology dominating the Saudi kingdom.
"You cannot talk about the war being over until you get rid of the terrorists in Syria,” Assad said in an interview with Italian TG5 channel.
"And those terrorists unfortunately still have formal support from many countries including Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and many Western countries," he added.
Assad described the recent liberation of Aleppo as "an important step toward ending the war.”
"If you do not have that external support to those terrorists, it will not be difficult at all to get rid [of] the terrorists everywhere in Syria.”
The Syrian president denounced the Wahhabism ideology as "the core problem” which creates extremist terrorists across the world and said, "If you want to deal with the issue of terrorism permanently, you have to deal with the pillar of that terrorism, which is the Wahhabi ideology.”
Assad lashed out at the European countries for supporting different terrorist groups under the name of "moderates”. "Their priority is not fighting terrorism; their priority is using those cards in order to change governments and to get rid of presidents, and so on.”
He made the comments hours after a meeting with a joint delegation, comprising members of the European Parliament as well as members of the Federation Council, the upper house of the Russian parliament, in Damascus.
During the meeting, Assad called on European states to stop their support for Takfiri terrorists and recognize the Syrian nation’s right to decide its own fate.