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 An advance into Raqqa would re-establish a Syrian government
foothold in the province for the first time since 2014 and may be
aimed at pre-empting any move by Saudi Arabia to send ground forces
to fight Islamic State militants in Syria.
Russia is pressing ahead with its four-month-old air campaign in
support of President Bashar al-Assad ahead of "a cessation of
hostilities" agreed by major powers on Friday. The agreement is due
to come into effect in a week.
The Syrian army announced the capture of more ground in the northern
Aleppo area, where its advances backed by allied Lebanese Hezbollah
and Iranian fighters have cut the main rebel supply route from
Turkey into opposition-held parts of Aleppo.
If its forces retake Aleppo and seal the Turkish border, Damascus
would deal a crushing blow to the insurgents who were on the march
until Russia intervened last September, shoring up Assad's rule and
paving the way to the current advances.
The cessation of hostilities agreement falls short of a formal
ceasefire, since it was not signed by the warring parties - the
government and rebels seeking to topple Assad in the five-year-long
war that has killed 250,000 people.
 Russia has said it will keep bombing Islamic State and the al
Qaeda-linked Nusra Front, which in many areas of western Syria
fights government forces in close proximity to insurgents deemed
moderates by Western states.
Helped by Russian air power, the Syrian army and its allies have
been pursuing offensives on crucial front lines of western Syria,
while also attacking Islamic State further east.
The Observatory said government troops were just a few kilometres
(miles) from the provincial borders of Raqqa after making a rapid
advance eastwards along a desert highway in the last few days from
Ithriya. The Syrian army could not immediately be reached for
comment.
The Syrian government has not had a major foothold in Raqqa province
since Islamic State insurgents captured Tabqa air base in 2014.
"They are on the provincial borders of Raqqa," Observatory director
Rami Abdulrahman told Reuters.
The ultra-hardline Islamic State, whose main aim is to expand its
"caliphate" rather than toppling Assad and reforming Syria, is being
targeted in separate campaigns by a U.S.-led alliance and the Syrian
government with Russian air support.
U.S.-allied Kurdish forces are also fighting Islamic State in Raqqa.
Last year, they advanced into Raqqa province from the northeast,
capturing an Islamic State-held town at the border with Turkey.
Gulf states that want Assad gone from power have said they would be
willing to send in troops as part of any U.S.-led ground attack
against Islamic State. U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on
Friday he expected Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to send
commandos to help recapture Raqqa.
In what may have been a response to those remarks, Russian Prime
Minister Dmitry Medvedev said on Saturday there was no need to scare
anyone with a ground operation in Syria.
The Syrian government has said that any foreign forces in the
country without its consent will be fought.
ALEPPO AIR STRIKES
Saudi Arabia's foreign minister, Adel al-Jubeir, said in an
interview published on Saturday that Russia's military interventions
will not help Assad stay in power. "There will be no Bashar al-Assad
in the future," he told a German newspaper.
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The complex, multi-sided civil war in Syria, raging since 2011, has
drawn in most regional and global powers, producing the world's
worst humanitarian emergency and attracting jihadist recruits from
around the world.
A U.S. State Department spokesman said on Friday Assad was "deluded"
if he thought there is a military solution to the war.
Two Syrian rebel commanders told Reuters on Friday insurgents had
been sent "excellent quantities" of Grad rockets with a range of 20
km (12 miles) by foreign backers in recent days to help confront the
Russian-backed offensive in Aleppo.
Foreign opponents of Assad including Saudi Arabia and Turkey have
been supplying vetted rebel groups with weapons via a Turkey-based
operations center.
Some of these groups have received military training overseen by the
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. The vetted groups have been a
regular target of the Russian air strikes.
Russian warplanes carried out at least 12 raids on rebel-held towns
north of Aleppo overnight Friday-Saturday, the Observatory said.
The army said late on Friday it had captured three areas to the
northwest of Aleppo - advances confirmed by the Observatory.
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls called on Russia on Saturday to
stop bombing civilians in Syria, saying this was crucial for
achieving peace in the country.
"France respects Russia and its interests ... But we know that to
find the path to peace again, the Russian bombing of civilians has
to stop," Valls said in a speech at a security conference in Munich.
Russia has denied targeting civilians. Medvedev said on Saturday it
was simply not true.
"There is no evidence of our bombing civilians, even though everyone
is accusing us of this," Medvedev told a security conference in
Munich, moments after French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said
Russian bombing of civilians must stop.
"Russia is not trying to achieve some secret goals in Syria. We are
simply trying to protect our national interests," he said, adding
that Moscow wanted to prevent Islamist militants getting to Russia.
(Additional reporting by Shadia Nasralla in Munich and Denis Dyomkin
in Moscow; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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