Extremists on Friday (November 16th) killed nine Syrian regime fighters near a planned buffer zone around the country's last major opposition stronghold, AFP reported.

A September deal between Russia and Turkey sought to establish a de-militarised zone around the northwestern region of Idlib.

But its implementation has been stalled since extremists, who hold around 70% of the planned buffer area, failed to withdraw by mid-October, and sporadic clashes have rocked the area since.

Early Friday, extremist groups attacked regime forces in the northwest of Hama province near the planned buffer zone, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

"Nine regime fighters and five assailants were killed" in the attack, causing regime forces to respond with artillery fire, Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.

The attackers included al-Qaeda-linked Hurras al-Deen, which has publicly rejected the deal.

The lion's share of Idlib is held by Tahrir al-Sham.

Under the September 17th deal, all fighters in the zone were supposed to withdraw their heavy weapons and extremists, including Tahrir al-Sham and Hurras al-Deen, were supposed to leave.