One airline said it had been told that Damascus Airport had been “shut down”
Many flights in and out of the Syrian capital Damascus have been cancelled for a second day after clashes spread to the road leading to the city’s airport on Thursday.
Several airlines say they currently are not able to use Damascus airport.
Internet and phone systems in Syria were also reportedly down for a second day.
Government officials and opposition activists blamed each other for the shutdown.
The Syrian government has previously cut off access to the internet during major operations.
However, correspondents say a nationwide switch-off is unprecedented.
Emirates airline and Egypt Air cancelled flights to Damascus on Thursday.
A spokesman for UAE-based Air Arabia told the BBC on Friday that its service to Damascus had been cancelled as “the terminus has been shut down”.
Royal Jordanian Airways also said it had suspended its Damascus route.
However airport source in Damascus told the AFP news agency on Friday that air traffic and passenger boarding was normal.
“For the moment, we have not had any arrivals, but the airport is operating normally,” the source said.
Refugees ‘targeted’
The government is sending reinforcements to the area around the airport, the BBC’s Lina Sinjab in Damascus reports.
Thursday saw some of the heaviest shelling yet in suburbs of the capital by government forces, our correspondent adds.
A source in the Free Syrian Army told the BBC that the attack on the airport had been planned for a long time.
The rebels carrying out the attack were all from eastern parts of the countryside around Damascus, known as the Ghouta, and were well armed after capturing government weapons, including heavy weapons, in recent weeks, the source added.
Meanwhile, the UN’s refugee agency has said it has received “disturbing reports” of refugees being targeted as they fled Syria, although it did not say who had targeted them.
The UNHCR also said that more than 250,000 people have been internally displaced in and around the flashpoint city of Homs.
Refugees are desperately lacking in basic supplies, including medicine, clothes and blankets, according to the UNHCR’s Melissa Fleming.
Activists say more than 40,000 people have been killed since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in March 2011.
More disruption to Syria flights http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/64484000/jpg/_64484374_64482330.jpg
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