Washington  28 Sep (ANA) - The US has pledged to provide $ 364m (£ 276m) more in humanitarian aid to people affected by the war in Syria. The funds, officials say, will help the UN and other charities provide food, safe water and medical care to those in the country and refugees in the region. Meanwhile, Syrian forces have made advances in the centre of Aleppo after days of heavy air strikes, reports say. And the World Health Organization has called for safe evacuation routes out of the city for the injured and sick. A spokeswoman said there were only 35 doctors left to care for hundreds of trapped patients, and the number of casualties was rising. Medical supplies were running out and there was a shortage of blood, she added. Russian-backed Syrian government forces launched an assault on rebel-held areas of eastern Aleppo on Thursday after a truce collapsed. Since then, the intense and sustained aerial bombardment of Aleppo and its surrounding countryside has killed at least 248 people, almost all of them civilians, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group.(ANA)

FA/ANA/28 September 2016-------