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Araghchi appeared in a photograph with Syrian foreign minister Bassam Sabbagh in Tehran. However, Iranian state media also released a clip purportedly showing Araghchi dining in a restaurant in Damascus.

Arab leaders including Jordan’s King Abdullah II and United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan have also called Assad to express their solidarity.

The insurgents took over most of Aleppo on Saturday and made gains in the surrounding province, including capturing a military academy and a strategic town that lies on the highway linking the city with Damascus and the coast.

They also took control of the main water pumping station for the city, which is no longer working, said Syrian Minister of Water Resources Moataz Qattan on the pro-government radio station Sham FM.

Elsewhere, rebel commander Colonel Hassan Abdulghani said the insurgents advanced in the countryside around Idlib, putting the province of the same name under their control.

They also claimed to have entered the city of Hama, but there was no independent confirmation of that.

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Abdulghani said 65 Syrian troops were taken prisoner in eastern Aleppo.

In Khan Sheikhoun, in Idlib province, military vehicles abandoned by Syrian troops dotted roads. People posed and took pictures of themselves on an abandoned tank on a highway, while insurgents grabbed munitions and shells from them before continuing to push deeper into Syria.

The insurgents vowed to push all the way into Damascus, but life in the Syrian capital remained normal, with no signs of panic. In southeastern Aleppo, however, the main road out of the city was gridlocked as people fled the fighting, and petrol stations in the area were short on fuel.

US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN’s State of the Union that the US, which has about 900 troops in Syria, is watching the situation carefully. The American forces, which are in the northeast and far from Aleppo, are guarding against a resurgence by the extremist Islamic State group.

The group leading the rebel advance is designated a terrorist organisation by the US, and Sullivan said Washington has “real concerns about the designs and objectives of that organisation”.

“At the same time, of course, we don’t cry over the fact that the Assad government, backed by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah, are facing certain kinds of pressure,” he added.

Syrian state news agency SANA and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that overnight the army pushed back insurgents in the northern countryside of Hama province.

Syrian state media said government resupply included heavy equipment and rocket launchers while Syrian and Russian airstrikes targeted weapon depots and insurgent strongholds.

Pro-government radio station Sham FM said the Syrian army shot down drones belonging to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in northern Hama.

Syrian state television claimed government forces had killed nearly 1000 insurgents over the past three days, without providing evidence or details.