Daesh blasts kill nearly 130 in Syria

Sayyida Zeinab, Syria — A string of suicide bombings near a Shiite shrine outside Syria’s capital and in Homs claimed by extremists killed at least 127 people Sunday, as Washington and Moscow worked to secure a ceasefire.

US Secretary of State John Kerry said a provisional deal had been reached on the terms of a truce in Syria’s brutal five-year conflict, only for the bloodshed to intensify on the ground.

Near Damascus, the attacks, including a car bombing, ripped through the area of the Shiite shrine of Sayyida Zeinab and killed 68 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

And two car bombs killed at least 59 people and wounded dozens in the pro-regime district of Al Zahraa in the central city of Homs, said the Britain-based monitoring group.

The Daesh terror group said it was behind the day’s carnage.

State television footage from Homs showed emergency workers carrying a charred body on a stretcher past devastated shops and mangled cars and minibuses.

Al Zahraa — whose residents are mostly from the same Alawite sect of Shia Islam as Syria’s ruling clan — has been regularly targeted.

Daesh said in an online statement that two militants drove explosive-laden cars into crowds of local residents.

Two more of its suicide bombers carried out the Sayyida Zeinab bombings, the extremist group said.

State television said a car bombing and two suicide attacks hit the area, killing 30 and wounding dozens in a preliminary toll, whereas the observatory gave a death toll of 68 in four attacks.

An AFP reporter said the blasts struck about 400 metres from the shrine which contains the grave of a granddaughter of Prophet Mohammad and is revered by Shiites.

At least 60 shops were damaged and cars reduced to mangled metal in the area, where a January attack also claimed by Daesh killed 70 people.

World powers have been pushing for a halt in fighting in Syria that was meant to take effect by last Friday, but have struggled to agree on the terms.