Turkey Says It Won't Leave Syrian Refugees to Die

Turkey said on Sunday it would not abandon thousands of Syrians stranded on its border after fleeing a major Russian-backed regime offensive, as aid agencies warned of a "desperate" situation.

Tens of thousands of people, including many women and children, have been uprooted as pro-government forces backed by intense Russian anti-rebel air strikes advance near Syria's second city Aleppo.

"Turkey has reached the limit of its capacity to absorb the refugees," Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus told CNN Turk television.

"But in the end, these people have nowhere else to go. Either they will die beneath the bombings... or we will open our borders."

"We are not in a position to tell them not to come. If we do, we would be abandoning them to their deaths."

Turkey's Oncupinar border crossing, which faces the Bab al-Salama frontier post inside Syria, remained closed Sunday to thousands of refugees gathered there for a third day, an AFP reporter said.

They waited desperately for the moment the gate will open, as Turkish aid trucks delivered food inside Syria.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saturday that Turkey was ready to open its gates to Syrian refugees "if necessary."

Carrying what few belongings they still have, Syrians queued in the cold and rain in squalid camps near the border, waiting for tents being distributed by aid agencies.

Others are reportedly sleeping in the open, in fields and on roads.

- 'Hospitals bombed' -

The medical aid agency Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said camps for displaced people in northern Aleppo province were overwhelmed.

"From what MSF can see the situation in Azaz district is desperate, with ongoing fighting and tens of thousands of people displaced," said Muskilda Zancada, head of the group's Syria mission.

"We are still conducting assessments but so far have seen problems with lack of space to accommodate people, and insufficient water and sanitation in many areas."

It said three MSF-supported hospitals had been bombed in recent days although the extent of the damage was unknown because their proximity to the front lines made access too difficult.

More than 260,000 people have died in Syria's nearly five-year-old conflict, which involves a tangled web of mainstream rebels, Islamists, jihadists, Kurds and pro-regime forces supported by Russia and Iran.

More than half the population has been displaced and hundreds of thousands have tried to reach Europe, sometimes paying with their lives making the risky Mediterranean Sea crossing.

The European Union on Saturday said Ankara was internationally obliged to keep its frontiers open to refugees, while also pressing the Turkish government to help stem the flow of migrants to Europe.

A Turkish official said the Oncupinar crossing was "open for emergency situations."

"Seven injured were taken to Turkey on Friday and one on Saturday for treatment at Turkish hospitals," he said.

Syrian government forces have closed in on Aleppo city in their most significant advance since Russia intervened in September in support of President Bashar Assad's government.

Regime troops advanced Sunday towards the rebel town of Tal Rifaat, around 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the Turkish frontier, a monitoring group said.

- Food crisis -

It is one of the last rebel strongholds in northern Aleppo province and government troops are just seven kilometers away, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Syria's mainstream rebels are now threatened with collapse after the regime severed their main supply line to Aleppo city.

Opposition forces and roughly 350,000 civilians inside rebel-held parts of the city face the risk of a government siege, a tactic that has been employed to devastating effect against other former rebel bastions.

"As supply lines to East Aleppo are nearly cut, MSF is worried about an impending food, water and fuel crisis in the coming weeks," said Zancada.

But near Damascus, 35 pro-regime militiamen and soldiers were killed in a rebel ambush at dawn in the opposition stronghold of Eastern Ghouta.

Top diplomats from countries trying to resolve the conflict are set to meet again on February 11 after the collapse of peace talks last week.

Pope Francis on Sunday urged the international community "to spare no effort to urgently bring parties back to the negotiating table," and appealed for generosity to ensure the "survival and dignity" of displaced Syrians.

Syria has reacted angrily to suggestions that Saudi Arabia and Turkey, which support rebel groups, could send in ground troops, saying "any aggressor will return to their country in a wooden coffin."

The United Arab Emirates said it was in favor of sending troops but that a ground intervention should be led by the United States, which is already spearheading a campaign of air strikes against the jihadists.