Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Dead children used to lure SAS in grenade booby-trap
Troops escape sick Islamic State trap
BRITISH special forces troops were almost blown up when Islamic State fighters booby-trapped children’s dead bodies with hidden grenades.
The small SAS convoy was heading to the Iraqi border in north-east Syria when they spotted two children lying by the road and thought they may be alive.
The elite troops stopped to help, and set up security positions in case of an ambush. Four of the group approached the children – believed to be brother and sister, aged around five and eight years – carrying medical bags.
But they realised they were dead and found 14 deadly grenades beneath them.
Wires were attached to the grenades’ pins, taped to the corpses and then buried in the ground. Any attempt to move the children would have pulled the wires taut, removing the grenades’ pins, and killing those who came to their aid.
The troops first looked for mines or roadside bombs nearby, then dismantled the grenades.
The soldiers dug a grave and buried the children. A source said: “You see lots of bodies, but kids are different and we thought they might be alive and couldn’t just drive past. They know IS used bodies to hide IEDS and checked to see if they were alive, quickly spotting more than a dozen grenades hooked up to them. “Sadly, they were both dead. It is thought they were brother and sister. “They couldn’t leave them lying there, so cleared the threat, buried them together and said a quick prayer.” Despite IS’S defeat in Syria there are thousands of extremists still at large in sleeper cells. The SAS patrol was operating in north-east Syria when it was told to withdraw to the Iraq border after Turkey launched attacks against Kurds in Syria. It came after President Donald Trump withdrew 1,000 US troops from Syria. Turkey views the Syriankurdish militia the YPG, which is part of the Western-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, as terrorists and wants to expel its members from its border region. Russian troops and Syrian regime forces have come to the Kurds’ aid, and are advancing towards Turkish lines.