ADEN: Gunmen opened fire Monday on the governor of Taiz’s motorcade, killing at least five security officers and wounding two others, authorities said.
The attack, targeting Nabil Shamsan, happened on a key road linking Taiz to the rest of the country, Mohamed Abdel-Rahman, a spokesman for the province, told The Associated Press. He added that two assailants were killed in the shootout.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.
In a statement, the governor’s office said security and military forces were working to bring those behind the attack to justice.
The province’s capital, also named Taiz, has been a battleground pitting the Iranian-backed Houthis and other militias backed by the Islamist Islah party against each other as well as other factions in Yemen’s civil war.
Taiz, in the southwest, is the junction of two crucial highways: an east-west road leading to the coastal city of Mocha on the Red Sea, and another north-south, to Sanaa via Dhamar and Ibb provinces. It has been under Houthi blockade since 2016 as part of their war against the internationally recognized Yemeni government.
The country’s brutal war began in 2014, when the Houthis marched from their northern stronghold of Saada province and forced the internationally recognized government into exile.
Gunmen attack the governor of Taiz’s motorcade, killing 5 security officers
https://arab.news/rkf3j
Gunmen attack the governor of Taiz’s motorcade, killing 5 security officers
- The attack targeted Nabil Shamsan on a key road in Taiz
- 2 assailants and 5 security officers were killed in the shootout
Syrian army declares Daesh-linked camp ‘closed security zone’
- Al-Hol is the largest camp for suspected Daesh relatives
- A military source said the army’s measure aimed to control security around the camp
DAMASCUS: Syria’s army announced Friday that a camp housing suspected relatives of Daesh group fighters was closed to the public, a measure a military source said was meant to bolster security around the facility.
Earlier this month, the army entered the vast Al-Hol camp after the withdrawal of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
In a statement Friday, it said the area was a “closed security zone.”
Located in a desert region of Hasakah province, Al-Hol is the largest camp for suspected Daesh relatives and is home to some 24,000 people, mostly women and children, including 6,200 foreigners.
A military source told AFP the army’s measure aimed to control security around the camp and maintain order within it.
Some camp residents fled during the “security vacuum” between when the SDF withdrew and the army took control, two former employees of organizations working at the site told AFP last week.
In recent days, new reports emerged of attempts to flee the camp.
In the latest issue of its official Al-Naba publication — translated by the SITE monitoring group — Daesh called on supporters to free women held captive in Al-Hol.
In 2014, Daesh swept across Syria and Iraq, committing massacres and forcing women and girls into sexual slavery, but backed by a US-led coalition, the Kurdish-led SDF ultimately defeated the militants in Syria five years later.
The SDF went on to jail thousands of suspected militants and detain tens of thousands of their relatives in camps.
When the Syrian army took control of the camp, most humanitarian organizations withdrew, and aid has only been trickling in since.
The Save the Children charity warned on Friday that the humanitarian situation in the camp was “rapidly deteriorating as food, water and medicines run dangerously low.”
After Syrian government forces advanced against Kurdish forces, Washington said it would transfer 7,000 Daesh suspects, previously held by Syrian Kurdish fighters, to Iraq.
The transfer is still underway.
