Maarat al-Naasan (Syria) (AFP) – Protests broke out across opposition-held parts of northwest Syria Friday against an al-Qaeda-linked jihadist group after it opened a trade crossing into regime territory, an AFP correspondent and a war monitor said. “Mass protests broke out in several towns and villages in the provinces of Idlib and Aleppo to denounce the practises of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham alliance” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor. Led by Syria’s former al-Qaeda affiliate, HTS and allied rebel groups dominate large swathes of Idlib province and slivers of neighbouring Aleppo.
