but a place that s been decimated by air strikes. and it is worth noting it is actually people on both sides that are starving. i mean, one of the reasons why this evacuation plan didn t go ahead today was because it was supposed to be a swap. there was a couple of towns that have been under a rebel siege. the civilians in those towns were supposed to be released as part of this agreement. they weren t released because the busses that were sent to collect them were set on fire. unfortunately, as this political and military game continues to play out and the sides continue to fight, you have civilians on both sides who are going through another night in the freezing cold, not knowing if they re going to have enough food tomorrow and not knowing if they ll be rescued tomorrow and get closer to safety. let s take a look at this picture. it is stunning. this is a little boy sitting among the ruins in aleppo, clutching a bag of stuffed animals. all alone. it s pictures like these that spe
this is why the evacuation mission to get families and children out of aleppo is called off again. it is too dangerous, authorities say. in fact, somebody set a few of these evacuation busses today on fire. that means many people will be forced to sleep on the streets or in bombed out buildings or freezing for yet another night. syrian troops almost completely have retaken aleppo after four years of rebel control. but the civilians who once found safe haven there are caught in the middle of the fighting. let s go to the border of syria and turkey. you ve spoken with some of the people who managed to escape, also speaking with some people still trapped inside aleppo. what are they facing tonight? well, poppy, the conditions are extremely difficult. it is a very cold night. below freezing in some cases. these are people who have nothing but the clothes on their back and maybe a blanket. they re sleeping outdoors in basically not just a war zone
finally some much needed relief for tens of thousands of families and children in the city of aleppo. a safe way out. these green buses and ambulance vans today were allowed to carry people out of aleppo where shooting and shelling and air strikes make it simply too dangerous for people who are not fighting the civil war. take a look at some these pictures. we have some aerials that were taken just this morning. they show not only long lines of evacuation buses but the near complete destruction of aleppo. this is one of the world s oldest cities and the most populous in syria . cnn s frederik pleitgen who was in aleppo just a few days ago is watching these developments from beirut. we were expecting this large-scale evacuation yesterday, what happened? what happened is the cease-fire fell apart in the last minute and shelling actually resumed. there was some heavy fighting yesterday where people who were locked up in that last enclave inside aleppo recorded as many as 100 artillery s
fred pleitgen joins us now. he s reporting from inside aleppo throughout the syrian civil war. joins us from beirut, lebanon. the cease-fire seems to be back on. what happens next and can it actually succeed this time? reporter: yeah, you know, that s going to be the big question, anderson. we re going to see that in the next couple of hours because about three hours from now is when buses are supposed to pull out to that rebel enclave that still exists in aleppo and supposed to bring the first people out and bring them to safety to other rebel-held areas in syria. the first people who are supposed to get evacuated are the most vulnerable. the sick, the the ones who have been wounded. the question is is that going to happen or is it going to fall apart? we shave to keep in mind, anderson, it s fallen apart once before and also you re dealing with a fragile situation, a lot of people on both sides who are very trigger happy who have been fighting each other for a long period of ti
and colleague inside aleppo who said all day there s been very heavy shelling. that has continued tonight with explosives lighting up the night sky. it s a terrible betrayal of the people inside eastern aleppo. the u.n. says there was about 50,000 of those in an area probably one square mile. we re still not sure how big it is and how many people are in there, but yesterday we saw some of them, bedraggled, leaving in terrible conditions, leaving the slaughter. we did think more would join them, but no, they are trapped. the rebels said they have begun to attack rebel forces. that s within the last few hours. the government said they were attacking and people have been describing airstrikes, what they call cluster bomb attacks all day long. we know there have been casualties, including children,