IDLIB: Syrian forces said they had surrounded on Wednesday a camp housing a prominent French militant wanted by his government, sparking clashes at the site according to a monitoring group.
The operation in northwest Syria was the Islamist-led government’s first known assault targeting militants since the ouster in December of longtime ruler Bashar Assad.
Since taking power, Syria’s new leaders have sought to break from their own radical Islamist past and present a moderate image more tolerable to ordinary Syrians and foreign powers.
The group of foreign militants targeted by government forces on Wednesday was Firqatul Ghuraba in Arabic, or the Foreigners’ Brigade, led by 50-year-old Oumar Diaby, a Franco-Senegalese criminal turned preacher who adopted the name Omar Omsen.
General Ghassan Bakir, a top security commander in the northwestern province of Idlib, in a statement said government forces had completely surrounded the camp near the Turkish border, where Diaby is holed up.
The operation followed accusations against the group of kidnapping a girl.
Security forces “sought to negotiate with the leader to voluntarily surrender to the relevant authorities, but he refused and barricaded himself inside the camp... and began firing, provoking security personnel, and terrorizing residents,” Bakir said.
A monitoring group that has documented violence in Syria since the start of the war in 2011 also reported the operation.
Security forces launched a “large-scale operation” after encircling the camp “with the aim of handing over French members wanted by their government,” said Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor.
Diaby’s son Jibril told AFP via WhatsApp that “the clashes began after midnight and are still ongoing,” adding that “security forces shelled the camp, which houses women and children.”
Jibril also said that the clashes were linked to “France’s wish to secure the extradition of two French members of the group.”
- Balancing act -
In September 2016, the United States designated Diaby, suspected of funnelling French-speaking fighters to Syria, as an “international terrorist.”
He is also wanted on a French arrest warrant.
The issue of foreign fighters who flocked to Syria during the years of conflict is a thorny one, wish some countries refusing to take fighters back.
Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, who once led Al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria, has played a delicate balancing act between presenting a moderate image to the world, and ensuring he does not antagonize the militants still in the country.
French security sources have previously told AFP that “around 50” people are believed to be part of Diaby’s group.
They have no known relation to the Daesh group, which was crushed in a US-led battle waged in alliance with Kurdish-led forces.
A resident of the Harem region, where the camp is located near the Turkish border, told AFP he had seen government forces bringing reinforcements to the area beginning Tuesday and had heard explosions.
