The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the delay was because rebels from Zabadani, one of the towns included in the deal, had not yet been granted safe passage out.
The departures Friday under the agreement marked the first stage in the population swap between rebel- and government-held areas. But as the government and rebels disagreed over the number of gunmen to be evacuated, the buses were left stuck at two separate parts, but adjacent parts of the city.
Hundreds of civilians and fighters who have been under crippling siege for more than two years left four Syrian towns in fleets of buses Friday under a delayed evacuation deal.
The agreement is one of several concluded in recent months that has seen Bashar al-Assad's regime take back control of areas long besieged by his forces and their allies. He said it is not clear what hinders the completion of the evacuation.
They have been touted by the government as the best way to end the fighting but rebels say they are forced out by siege and bombardment.
Critics have denounced the deal as forced displacement, and the U.N.is not supervising the evacuations.
People waiting in the Ramousah garage heard the blast, and said they feared revenge attacks by pro-government forces. "They were evacuating under a deal contingent on residents of two pro-rebel towns being allowed to evacuate".
Pro-opposition media also said that dozens were killed. The evacuation deal was brokered by Iran and Qatar. "My house, land and belongings are all in al-Foua", Mehdi Tahhan said.
"There's no drinking water or food", Madaya resident Ahmed, 24, told Reuters news agency earlier, speaking from the bus garage in Aleppo where he and others had been reportedly waiting since Friday night.
Good Friday marked with solemn church services
Wilson explains, on Easter morning the disciples saw Jesus' grave clothes lying on the cold slab, still wrapped round and round. Baptized into his death and resurrection, we live the heavenly life of the risen Christ, our lives "hidden with Christ in God".
There already was mounting frustration when the explosion occurred: Thousands of evacuees from pro-government and opposition areas were stuck on opposite sides of the edge of Aleppo city as rebels and government bickered over the terms for evacuating fighters.
"We are not moving forward or backward", he said.
The Observatory said 2,200 people from Zabadani and Madaya had left, among them 400 rebels.
Madaya and Zabadani, on the other hand, are believed to now be wholly inhabited by Sunnis, the effect of six years of deft political maneuvering by Assad to steer what started as a broad movement against his authority into a choice between him and Sunni Islamist rule.
The convoy of coaches was headed to Aleppo from rebel territory in northern Syria.
Playing on fears of al-Qaida rule, Assad's government showed leniency to the country's Christian, Shiite and Alawite minorities while bringing the weight of its military against majority Sunni areas - especially Sunni pockets in demographically mixed areas, such as along the Lebanese border, where Madaya and Zabadani lie, and along the Mediterranean coast.
He has been backed militarily by Russian Federation, and by Shi'ite fighters from Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah group in Syria's six-year-old conflict.
Assad holds the military advantage over rebels in the west of the country thanks to Russia's intervention in 2015, although the insurgents continue to fight back and have made gains in some areas.
Comments