Russia warned the U.S.-led coalition Wednesday against driving jihadists from Iraq to Syria, in the offensive to recapture Mosul from the Islamic State jihadist group. 

Air strikes killed at least 12 civilians in Syria's Aleppo on Monday, a monitor said, bringing to 45 the number killed in 24 hours of bombardment on the battleground city.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said five children were among the dead on Monday in the rebel-held district of Marjeh in east Aleppo.

Police in bullet-proof vests guard a military court for the terrorism trial of Varvara Karaulova, a slim 20-year-old with braided hair who clutches a page of handwritten notes.

Karaulova was studying philosophy at the renowned Moscow State University when she tried to enter Syria last year after falling in love online with an Islamic State fighter.

Turkish-backed rebel fighters on Sunday captured the northern Syrian town of Dabiq from the Islamic State jihadist group, a monitoring group and rebels said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was trying to build momentum behind a new drive to end the Syrian civil war Sunday after high-level talks with Russia and the country's neighbors.

Syrian government forces Sunday kept up their blistering assault on rebel-held eastern Aleppo after a divided U.N. Security Council failed to agree on a truce to "save" the war-battered city.

The U.N.'s Syria envoy on Thursday made an impassioned appeal to save eastern Aleppo, warning the city faced total destruction and urging Islamist fighters to leave so civilians can get aid.

Three children were among at least 19 civilians killed in an air strike on a village held by the Islamic State group in northern Syria on Wednesday, a monitor said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry insisted Tuesday that Washington was still seeking peace in Syria, but said it had dropped ceasefire talks with Russia because of "outrage' over Moscow's support for the regime.

Air strikes shook a besieged rebel-held town east of the Syrian capital on Monday, sparking fears among civilians of a fate similar to battered Aleppo city.