US-backed Arab-Kurd group seizes major Syria oilfield

A US-backed Arab-Kurd alliance yesterday said it had retaken one of Syria’s largest oilfields from ISIL in the east of the country.

Al Omar oilfield in the province of Deir Ezzor produced 30,000 barrels a day before the start of Syria’s conflict in 2011, and became a key source of income for the extremists after they seized it in 2014.

Coalition air strikes destroyed the field in 2015 after the militants had taken estimated oil sale revenues of up to US$5.1 million (Dh18.7m) a month.

“The Syrian Democratic Forces seized the whole of Al Omar oilfield, the biggest field in Syria,” the alliance said.

It said regime forces were three kilometres from the field.

The forces and Russia-backed government troops are waging separate offensives against ISIL in the oil-rich province of Deir Ezzor on Syria’s eastern border with Iraq.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said SDF fighters took control of Al Omar days after ISIL troops withdrew.

Its capture came after the jihadists led “a counterattack on regime positions near the field late on Saturday, pushing them away from it”, Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.

Al Omar lies on the east bank of the Euphrates River, about 10 kilometres east of the town of Mayadeen.

Government forces and their allies seized Mayadeen from ISIL last week in the advance to recapture Al Omar.

Yesterday, the monitor said the SDF had overnight also seized the Sayjan oilfield to the north of Al Omar.

Deir Ezzor province is rich with oil and gasfields that were a key revenue stream for ISIL.

The SDF, which this week forced ISIL from its former stronghold Raqqa, has been fighting the jihadists on the east bank of the Euphrates.

Syria’s army is carrying out a separate operation mostly on the west bank of the river, including in Deir Ezzor city, the provincial capital.