Russia denies involvement in Syria school attack

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for "an immediate and impartial investigation" into the attacks.

Moscow, Oct 28 Russian Defense Ministry denied the involvement of the alleged airstrikes on a school in Idlib in Syria, saying the evidence spreading among media was "fabricated."

"The video of an alleged airstrike that appeared in a various foreign media was made of ten clips put together, and shot with a different resolution at different time," the ministry's spokesman Igor Konashenkov said in a statement on Thursday.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said on Wednesday that an air raid, allegedly carried out by Russian warplanes, targeted civilian areas in Idlib, including a school compound, killing at least 26 civilians, Xinhua news agency reported.

"This is a tragedy. It is an outrage. And if deliberate, it is a war crime," executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund Anthony Lake said, calling the strike "the deadliest attack on a school" in the five-and-a-half-year-long crisis in the war-raged Middle East country.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for "an immediate and impartial investigation" into the attacks.

"If such horrific acts persist despite global outrage, it is largely because their authors, whether in corridors of power or in insurgent redoubts, do not fear justice," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a press briefing.

IANS