2,000 IS fighters remain in Raqqa

WASHINGTON: About 2,000 IS fighters are estimated to remain in the Syrian city of Raqqa, fighting for their survival in the face of an offensive by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, a senior US official said.

Brett McGurk, US special envoy for the coalition against IS, said the SDF had cleared about 45 per cent of Raqqa since launching an attack in early June to seize IS’s stronghold in northern Syria.

“Today in Raqqa IS is fighting for every last block... and fighting for their own survival” McGurk told reporters.

Some 2,000 IS fighters are left in the city and “most likely will die in Raqqa,” he said. The assault on Raqqa coincided with the final stages of a campaign to drive IS from the Iraqi city of Mosul, where the militants were defeated last month.

McGurk said IS has lost 70,000 sq km of the territory it once held in the two countries — 78 per cent of what they had seized in Iraq and 58 per cent of what they held in Syria.

Before every military operation, coalition forces surround the area targeted to make sure IS’s foreign fighters cannot escape and make their way out of Iraq and Syria, he said.

With the close cooperation of Turkish forces, the entire SyrianTurkish border was sealed and IS can no longer send militants trained in Syria for attacks in Europe and elsewhere, McGurk said.

The coalition has compiled a database of almost 19,000 names of IS fighters gathered from cellphones, address books and other documents found on battlefields which it is sharing with the international police agency Interpol, he said.

IS is also fighting the forces of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, who is backed by Russian air power and militias.

McGurk said “deconfliction” arrangements the US and Russian militaries have made to avoid accidents as they operate separately in Syria were working well despite deteriorating diplomatic relations between the two countries.

President Donald Trump said on Thursday the US-Russian relationship was at “an all-time and very dangerous low,” and Russia said new sanctions imposed by Washington meant an end to hopes for better ties with the Trump administration.

— AFP Syrian civilians and militants who were evacuated from northeastern Lebanon gather near buses after crossing into the rebel-held area of Al Saan in the central Hama province. Nearly 8,000 Syrian refugees from Lebanon arrived in central Syria as part of...