Vladimir Putin, Bashar al-Assad will create more terrorists: Top spy

London/ Damascus: The boss of the British spy service, the MI6, has issued a warning that Russia's continued military intervention in war-torn Syria was creating more terrorists who posed a serious threat to most of the free world. In a rare speech for an intelligence chief, Alex Younger said British teams had already foiled 12 terrorist plots since June 2013 and warned that the “murderously efficient” Islamic State group was still plotting attacks from Syria, despite recent military reverses. “The plight of the Syrians continues to worsen,” Younger told journalists in his first public comments since taking up the post of “C” in 2014.

He slammed Russia's tactics and philosophy used while suppressing the rebels. "In defining as a terrorist anyone who opposes a brutal government, they alienate precisely the group that has to be on side if the extremists are to be defeated… I cannot say with any certainty what the next year will bring; but I know this we cannot be safe from the threats that emanate from the land unless the civil war is brought to an end. In Aleppo, Russia and the Syrian regime seek to make a desert and call it peace," he said. Back in Syria, President Bashar al-Assad said victory in Aleppo would be a “huge step” towards ending Syria's five-year civil war, ignoring pleas for a truce as rebels in the city lose more ground.

In a blistering three-week offensive, Syrian government forces have seized about 80 per cent of east Aleppo, a stronghold for rebel groups since 2012, with increasingly cornered opposition factions calling for an “immediate five-day humanitarian ceasefire”. The United States, Britain and France have also called for a truce, warning of a “humanitarian catastrophe”. US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov were set to meet on Thursday in Germany's Hamburg after talks the previous day failed to achieve a breakthrough on efforts to halt the fighting in the devastated city.