Syrian regime shelling killed six civilians including women and children on Saturday in Idlib province, the country's last main opposition bastion, a war monitor said.

 

An AFP photographer at the scene reported seeing several bodies being taken away from a wrecked home in Maarat al-Naasan, an area close to regime-controlled territory.

 

“The shell fell on a civilian home,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based group with a network of sources on the ground in the war-torn country.

 

The monitor said two women and two children were among those killed, who were all from the same family. Many others were wounded.

 

The shelling had begun at around 11:30 GMT, with more shells fired intermittently afterwards, the AFP photographer said.

 

The Syrian regime and its ally Russia have regularly targeted hospitals and civilian areas since the start of the war in 2011, according to the Observatory.

 

The Idlib region bordering Turkey is home to about three million people and it is one of the last pockets to oppose Damascus.