GENEVA AND WASHINGTON — US Secretary of State John Kerry, shuttling to Geneva for consultations with the United Nations, said he hoped that an announcement could be imminent as early as May 3 that a partial Syria cease-fire would be extended to Aleppo, after the United States and Russia agreed to expand a joint Syria cease-fire monitoring and enforcement operation out of the UN in Geneva. But even as Kerry and UN Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura consulted with the Russians on plans for an expanded, “24/7” Syria cease-fire monitoring mechanism, fighting raged on in Aleppo as Syrian state media accused rebels of an attack on a hospital a week after the regime was accused of attacks on three medical facilities; one of those attacks last week killed one hospital’s last pediatrician.
"The bottom line is, there is no justification for this horrific violence that targets civilians or medical facilities or first responders, no matter who it is," Kerry told journalists at the State Department May 3. "We condemn any of these attacks no matter who commits them."
