FRI 29 - 3 - 2024
 
Date: Aug 31, 2017
Source: The Daily Star
Fierce Syria fighting in regime push
Agence France Presse
BEIRUT: Fierce fighting between Syrian government forces and Daesh (ISIS) has killed 64 combatants in Raqqa province over a 24-hour period, an activist group said Wednesday. The clashes come with the army pressing an advance through Raqqa, in northern Syria, toward neighboring Deir al-Zor.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights activist group said the fighting had claimed the lives of 38 militants and 26 pro-regime combatants since Tuesday morning. It takes to 145 the overall death toll in six days of fighting in villages on the banks of the Euphrates River in the east of Raqqa province, near Deir al-Zor.

Daesh said in a statement Tuesday that its members had killed dozens of regime combatants in “intense fighting lasting hours.”

Observatory director Rami Abdel-Rahman told AFP that the regime was fighting to secure a foothold in Raqqa province “in order to advance in Deir al-Zor.”

The militants have laid siege to government forces and civilians in the provincial capital of Deir al-Zor since 2015. Earlier this month, government troops and allied fighters arrived at the outskirts of Madan, the last Daesh-held town in the countryside of eastern Raqqa province before Deir al-Zor. But Daesh launched a counterattack last week that pushed the regime forces back, and fighting has since continued.

The Syria army operation in the area, backed by air support from ally Russia, is separate from the battle for provincial capital Raqqa city.

The effort to oust Daesh from the city is being led by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a U.S.-backed alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters.

Separately, Human Rights Watch called Wednesday for an independent inquiry to probe the fate of thousands of people who have disappeared in Syria’s war and to identify mass graves.

At least 460,000 people have been killed and millions displaced, but HRW says the exact number of those missing could not be determined as most detention facilities were off-limits to outsiders.

“An independent institution in charge of investigating the fate and whereabouts of the disappeared, as well as unidentified human remains and mass graves in Syria, should be created immediately,” HRW said.

The New York-based rights watchdog issued the appeal in a statement coinciding with the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances.

Last year, a team of U.N. experts raised the alarm over enforced disappearances and called for the situation to be referred to the International Criminal Court.

“Syria will not be able to move forward if negotiations fail to adequately address the horrors of detention and disappearance,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at HRW. “This should not be ignored. Without progress, each day that passes will likely see more of the disappeared tortured or executed,” she said. The watchdog said the inquiry “should have a broad mandate to investigate, including by reviewing all official records and interviewing any official.”

Thousands of peace activists were arrested during the first years of the Syrian conflict, and some are still languishing in prisons, according to non-governmental organizations.

Earlier this month, the death of prominent computer scientist Bassel Khartabil Safadi was confirmed two years after his execution by the regime. Safadi had been arrested in March 2012 in the wake of the crackdown.


 


 
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