ISIL lays mines around Palmyra

Extremists in new threat to ancient Unesco heritage site in Syria

DAMASCUS // ISIL has laid mines around ancient ruins in Palmyra, prompting fears for the fate of Syria’s Unesco World Heritage site.

The extremist group, which destroyed ancient sites in Iraq this year, laid the explosives around Palmyra’s Greco-Roman ruins on Saturday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

“It is not known if the purpose is to blow up the ruins or to prevent regime forces from advancing into the town,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Britain-based monitoring group that relies on sources inside Syria. Mr Abdel Rahman said regime forces launched heavy airstrikes against the residential part of Palmyra in the past three days, killing at least 11 people.

“The regime forces are to the west of the city and in recent days they have brought in reinforcements, suggesting they may be planning an operation to retake Palmyra,” he said.

A political source said a top commander had been sent to the region to organise an offensive to recapture and secure Palmyra, and several key gasfields near by.

Syria’s antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim said he had received reports from Palmyra residents that the ruins had been mined.

“We have preliminary information from residents saying that this is correct, they have laid mines at the temple site,” he said. “We are worried.”

Mr Abdulkarim urged Palmyra “residents, tribal chiefs and religious and cultural figures to intervene to prevent what happened in northern Iraq”.

“I am very pessimistic and feel sadness,” he said.

ISIL took Palmyra, famed for its large and well-preserved ruins, on May 21. The group regularly mines its territory to make it harder to recapture.

Palmyra’s fall prompted international fears about the fate of the heritage site, described by Unesco as of “outstanding universal value”.

Before the city was taken, the head of the UN agency urged that the ruins be spared as “an irreplaceable treasure for the Syrian people, and the world”.

ISIL has released several videos documenting its destruction of heritage sites in Iraq and Syria.

In its extreme interpretation of Islam, statues, idols and shrines are objects of worship other than God that must be destroyed. There have been no reports of damage to sites in Palmyra since ISIL seized it, although the group’s fighters reportedly entered the city’s museum, which had largely been emptied of its collection before they arrived.

ISIL executed more than 200 people in and around Palmyra in the days after capturing the city, including 20 who were shot dead in the ancient ruins, the Observatory said.

Before Syria’s war began, more than 150,000 tourists visited Palmyra each year, admiring its beautiful statues, more than 1,000 columns and formidable necropolis with more than 500 tombs.

It had already suffered before ISIL’s arrival, with clashes between rebels and government forces in 2013 destroying columns and statues.

The site is also believed to have been looted during the chaos of the war that began in March 2011 with anti-government protests. In December, the UN said nearly 300 cultural heritage sites in Syria, including Palmyra, had been destroyed, damaged and looted.