Russia agreed to a 48-hour cease-fire in the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo after a haunting video of a Syrian boy injured by an air strike went viral on the Internet on August 18.
The image of the dazed and weary boy, sitting in an ambulance caked with dust and blood on his face, captured the horror that has beset the city, a Syrian rebel stronghold that has been under siege for months by government troops backed by Russian air strikes.
The wide circulation of the video and horrified international reaction was reminiscent of the reaction to a photo of the body of a Syrian toddler which washed up on a Turkish beach last year.
"That little boy has never had a day in his life where there hasn't been war, death, destruction, poverty in his own country," U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said of the Aleppo boy.
The cease-fire next week will allow humanitarian assistance to be delivered in Aleppo and will be a "pilot project" for further possible cease-fires, Russian General Igor Konashenkov announced late August 18.
He said Russia is ready to provide protection to United Nations aid efforts in the city.
