BEIRUT: A Turkish drone strike Tuesday killed at least four people in a northeast Syrian city held by Kurdish forces, the latest in a flurry of attacks, a war monitor said.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the attack struck near a hospital in Qamishli, the defacto capital of a semi-autonomous Kurdish administration that runs large parts of the country’s northeast.
The four victims, all affiliated with the administration, were killed while they dug trenches near Turkey’s border in anticipation of a new offensive that Ankara has threatened to launch since May, the monitor said.
Ankara has launched successive military offensives in Syria. Most have targeted Kurdish militants that Ankara links to a group waging a decades-long insurgency against it.
Turkey has stepped up its drone strikes in Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria since a July 19 summit with Iran and Russia failed to greenlight a fresh offensive, according to Kurdish officials and the Observatory.
A Turkish drone strike on Qamishli at the weekend killed four people, including two siblings, said the Observatory.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces have counted at least 13 of their members killed in several Turkish attacks since July 19.
Syria’s conflict that began in March 2011 has killed nearly half a million people and displaced half the country’s pre-war population.
Turkish drone strike kills 4 in northeast Syria: Monitor
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Turkish drone strike kills 4 in northeast Syria: Monitor
- Turkey has stepped up its drone strikes in Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria since a July 19 summit with Iran and Russia failed to greenlight a fresh offensive, according to Kurdish officials and the Observatory
Iraq starts investigations into Daesh detainees moved from Syria
- Those detainees are among 7,000 Daesh suspects, previously held by Syrian Kurdish fighters
- In 2014, Daesh swept across Syria and Iraq, committing massacres and forcing women and girls into sexual slavery
BAGHDAD: Iraq’s judiciary announced on Monday it has begun its investigations into more than 1,300 Daesh group detainees who were transferred from Syria as part of a US operation.
“Investigation proceedings have started with 1,387 members of the Daesh terrorist organization who were recently transferred from the Syrian territory,” the judiciary’s media office said in a statement, using the Arabic acronym for Daesh.
“Under the supervision of the head of Iraq’s Supreme Judicial Council, several judges specializing in counterterrorism started the investigation.”
Those detainees are among 7,000 Daesh suspects, previously held by Syrian Kurdish fighters, whom the US military said it would transfer to Iraq after Syrian government forces recaptured Kurdish-held territory.
They include Syrians, Iraqis and Europeans, among other nationalities, according to several Iraqi security sources.
In 2014, Daesh swept across Syria and Iraq, committing massacres and forcing women and girls into sexual slavery.
Backed by US-led forces, Iraq proclaimed the defeat of Daesh in the country in 2017, and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) ultimately beat back the group in Syria two years later.
The SDF went on to jail thousands of suspected extremists and detain tens of thousands of their relatives in camps.
Last month, the United States said the purpose of its alliance with Kurdish forces in Syria had largely expired, as Damascus pressed an offensive to take back territory long held by the SDF.
In Iraq, where many prisons are packed with Daesh suspects, courts have handed down hundreds of death sentences and life terms to people convicted of terrorism offenses, including many foreign fighters.
Iraq’s judiciary said its investigation procedures “will comply with national laws and international standards.”
