Syria arms depot explosion kills at least 14

Syrian authorities reported that at least 14 people were killed and another 11 wounded on Wednesday as a result of an explosion at a temporary site used to store weapons and remnants of the country's long-running civil war.

The explosion took place near the city of Sarmada in the northwestern Idlib province.

Syria's Defense Ministry said the weapons and war remnants were being stored termporarily at the site before being transported elsewhere. It said that some of its personnel were among those wounded.

The explosion in an area full of volatile materials led to secondary explosions and fires that hampered the emergency response. Smoke billowed from the blast site for some time on Wednesday.

"The toll from the explosion in a temporary storage for collecting weapons and war remnants near the city of Sarmada ... registered 14 killed and 11 injured in a preliminary count," the Idlib health department said.

It was the second fatal incident of its kind in Idlib province this month. On September 1, five people were killed and others were wounded when a vehicle carrying ammunition exploded in Binnish.

Syria only recently emerged from more than a decade of civil war, when forces loyal to new President Ahmed al-Sharaa ousted Bashar Assad and took control of Damascus. Idlib was one of the hardest-hit regions in the country during the war.

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