Islamic State holding civilians in village

EXTREMISTS ‘HIDING AMONG THEM’

ISLAMIC State militants are preventing more than 1,000 civilians from leaving a tiny area still held by the extremist group in a village in eastern Syria, a spokesman for the US-backed Syrian militia fighting the group has said.

“Regrettably, Daesh have closed all the roads,” Mustafa Bali, a spokesman for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, said, referring to IS by its Arabic acronym.

SDF officials have said the extremists are hiding among civilians in a tented village and using a network of caves and tunnels.

IS, which once ruled a protostate in large parts of Syria and Iraq, is clinging to an area less than a square mile in Baghouz.

The extremists may include high-level commanders, and could be holding hostages among those trapped inside.

Occasional coalition air strikes and clashes continue inside the Baghouz. Artillery rounds were meant to clear land mines for the SDF fighters to advance. SDF commanders say the end of IS’ self-declared caliphate is near.

“We will very soon bring good news to the whole world,” Ciya Furat, an SDF commander, said at the al-Omar Oil Field Base in the Deir el-Zour province on Saturday.

The capture of the last pocket of territory held by IS in either Syria or Iraq would mark the end of a four-year global campaign to end the extremist group’s so-called caliphate.