ALEPPO: At least 48 people were killed and nearly 100 wounded, most of them soldiers, in a spate of car bombs that blasted the heart of Syria's second city Aleppo on Wednesday, a watchdog said.
"Most of the dead and wounded are regime troops," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, citing medical sources.
A local official reported an initial toll of 37 dead and dozens wounded, many of them critically.
"The toll could rise because many people were badly injured," a city official told AFP, shortly after three bombs exploded around Saadallah al-Jabiri Square, near a military officers' club and a hotel.
Two of the blasts hit the area near the club within a minute of each other.
A third car bomb then exploded some 150 metres (yards) away in the Bab Jnein district, at the entrance of the Old City neighbourhood of Aleppo.
Near the officers' club, part of the facade of a hotel was destroyed by the force of the blasts, an AFP correspondent at the scene said, adding that a two-storey cafe collapsed completely.
"We heard two enormous explosions, as though the gates of hell were opening," Hassan, a 30-year-old man who works in a nearby hotel, told AFP.
"I saw thick smoke, and I helped a woman on the pavement whose arms and legs were completely dislocated," said Hassan.
A shopowner whose store is located a block away from the officers' club said: "I pulled out from the rubble a child less than 10 years old who has lost a leg."
All government buildings in the area were closed, he added.
Official television channel Al-Ikhbariya showed massive destruction in the square.
At least two buildings collapsed completely, and bloody corpses were laid out on the rubble, the broadcaster showed.
"There are still people trapped under the rubble!" called out men in the square, as the channel showed people evacuating some of the victims.
No armed group has claimed responsibility for the attacks on the high-security area.
Elsewhere, rebel fighters attacked a political intelligence branch in Aleppo as well as an old vegetable market where a large number of troops were posted, said the Observatory. Overnight, rebels also destroyed two tanks in the city.
Fierce fighting has raged in several neighbourhoods of Aleppo, especially after rebels launched a "decisive offensive" on Thursday to take control of the key Syrian city.
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