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Syrian girl pulled from Aleppo rubble in four-hour rescue

A young Syrian girl has been pulled alive from underneath rubble after an airstrike that apparently killed 24 people.

Footage filmed by the Syrian Civil Defence (SDF) rescue team shows the terrified youngster screaming as they try to keep her calm and pass her water to keep her alive.

After drilling through concrete for four hours they create enough space to reach her and eventually prise the girl out through a gap.

Covered in dust and still visibly distressed, she is carried away to an ambulance in Aleppo's al Shaar district.

It follows earlier rescues in the city of a girl and a baby.

The SDF, nicknamed the White Helmets, said 400 people have been killed in air attacks in Aleppo since a ceasefire brokered by the US and Russia failed.

The White Helmets named the girl as Ghazal Qasim and said she was taken to hospital.

The Syrian Civil Defence claimed that the attack had carried out by the Russians.

Another 15 people, mostly women and children, were said to have been injured.

Forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al Assad have carried out a barrage of air strikes on eastern Aleppo since Syria's regime announced last week it was trying to retake all of the divided city.

Russian forces are also understood to have been involved in the air attacks.

The United States threatened on Wednesday to stop engaging with Russia over the conflict as a result of the escalating attacks on Aleppo.

Among the targets hit on Wednesday were the two largest hospitals in Aleppo's opposition-controlled east.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon denounced the strikes on the hospitals as war crimes.

The Russian defence ministry said Moscow would be prepared to restart talks with the United States, but a Syrian opposition official said a political solution to the conflict was "no longer a viable option".

Moscow and Washington have blamed each for the collapse of a truce to allow aid to enter Aleppo.

President Barack Obama defended his refusal to use military force to end the war in Syria during a TV interview in the US on Wednesday, saying he was constantly re-examining how it is dealing with the situation.

Meanwhile, a German woman kidnapped in Syria last year while pregnant has been released along with her baby, Germany's foreign ministry has said.

The pair were freed on Wednesday and had safely crossed the border into Turkey, a ministry spokeswoman said, without naming the woman.