Two pro-government villages in northwestern Syria were evacuated on Thursday, state television said, in an agreement between the Damascus government and insurgents who had laid siege to them for several years.
In exchange, the government was due to release hundreds of prisoners from its jails. Pro-Damascus TV stations said at least 20 buses carrying "militants" released from jail had crossed into rebel-held territory under the agreement.
Close to 7,000 people — civilians and fighters — were due to leave the loyalist Shiite villages of al-Foua and Kefraya in Idlib province. They were ferried out in a convoy of buses through rebel-held territory to nearby government-held territory in Aleppo province, state TV footage showed.