Syria’s Assad tours once rebel-held Aleppo city, power plant

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian state media say that President Bashar Assad has made a rare visit to the northern province of Aleppo to tour the country’s largest city and inaugurate a power station that was once held by insurgents and suffered wide damages during the war. The visit on Friday by Assad and his family to the city of Aleppo — Syria’s largest city and once the nation’s commercial center — is his first since government forces captured its rebel-held eastern neighborhoods in December 2016. Syria’s infrastructure saw much destruction during the 11-year conflict. Earlier in the day, the state news agency, SANA, said Assad also visited the power station in the eastern part of Aleppo province.