Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
‘Al-baghdadi still alive and seen in Syria’
ISLAMIC State leader Abu Bakr al-baghdadi could still be alive and hiding out among diehard followers, it has been claimed.
The 46-year-old Iraqi terror boss was thought to have been killed in a Russian airstrike in June, but there are now rumours he survived the attack.
Hezbollah, one of the Shia militia fighting IS in Syria, said al-baghdadi may have been in the Syrian town of Albu Kamal.
Intelligence reports claimed he had been there in the past few days as the Syrian army launched an operation to clear it.
But the U.s.-led coalition against IS said it had no “releasable information” on Baghdadi’s whereabouts.
Syria’s army declared victory over IS this week.