TWENTY foreign UN workers have been given the green light by the Syrian government to monitor the evacuation of people from eastern Aleppo.

UN humanitarian affairs spokesman Jens Laerke said the UN monitors would arrive “as soon as they can.” It takes the total of UN workers to 120 and the number of foreigners to 30.

Meanwhile the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said that 10 buses had arrived into western Aleppo carrying evacuees from insurgent-besieged villages Foua and Kffarya.

Just two days ago, al-Qaida-linked rebels burnt a convoy of buses meant to evacuate the villages as part of a swap deal.

ICRC spokeswoman Ingy Sedky said evacuations would continue throughout yesterday and that so far 25,000 people have been bussed out of eastern Aleppo.

Separately, a Turkish official said yesterday that the policeman who assassinated Russian ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov was not acting alone.

Twenty-two-year-old riot squad officer Mevlut Mert Altintas shouted slogans about Aleppo, which Syrian government troops retook with Russian air support from armed rebels.

The Turkish official claimed it was “fully professional” killing, “not a one-man action.”

Russian and Turkish foreign ministers laid flowers in front a photo of Mr Karlov in Moscow. They said Turkey, Russia and Iran were willing to guarantee a peace deal in Syria.

Turkey has previously funnelled money and arms to Syrian insurgents.

As world leaders condemned the assassination, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro called on Western countries to end “the campaigns of hate and falsification” against Russia.