BEIRUT: As opposition fighters attempted to advance their lightning onslaught against government forces farther south, thousands of people left the central Syrian city of Homs overnight and into Friday morning, according to residents and a war monitoring group.
Nearly 14 years after anti-Assad protests started throughout Syria, they have already taken control of the strategic towns of Aleppo in the north and Hama in the center, delivering President Bashar al-Assad a series of setbacks.
Thousands of people started to evacuate Thursday night toward the government’s stronghold in the western coastal districts, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring organization headquartered in the United Kingdom.
According to a local, thousands of civilians have started moving from Homs to the coastline region because of fear of the rebels’ quick march.
In the course of this evolution, Russian
