Russian military adviser in Aleppo dies of shelling wounds

A Russian military adviser in Aleppo has died of wounds sustained in a mortar attack carried out by Syrian opposition fighters, the Kremlin confirmed on Wednesday, the third Russianfatality in Syria this week.

Russian news agencies had previously cited the defence ministry as saying that Colonel Ruslan Galitsky had died after being wounded in the shelling of western Aleppo.

Local media in eastern Russia said Galitsky had served as the commander of a tank brigade in Ulan Ude before going to Syria. They said he had been injured in Aleppo on Monday in rebel shelling of a Russianmilitary field hospital.

The defence ministry has previously said that two female Russian medics died in and after the same attack.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Galitsky would be posthumously given a top military award.

Syria has been locked in a devastating civil war since early 2011 when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests -- which erupted as part of the "Arab Spring" uprisings -- with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed and millions more displaced by the conflict.