SDF smashes Daesh defences in east
They achieved quick progress inside Hajin, the largest of the villages that were controlled by Daesh: Monitor
BEIRUT: KURDISH-LED Forces on Thursday moved deep into Hajin, the main village in the last pocket still held by the Daesh group in eastern Syria, a war monitor said.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), with support from air strikes conducted By THE US-LED Coalition, Deployed Across the Euphrates Valley village.
“The SDF managed to break the defences of the Daesh group after massing A LARGE number of ighters BACKED By the international coalition,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
“They achieved quick progress inside Hajin, the largest of the villages that were controlled by Daesh,” Rami Abdel RAHMAN, THE HEAD of THE BRITAIN-BASED monitoring organisation, said.
The SDF said on social media they had “liberated the city centre of Hajin and the big mosque”.
Hajin lies on the east bank of the Euphrates in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor, about 30 kilometres (18 miles) from the border with Iraq. The area held by Daesh is sometimes referred to as the “Hajin pocket”, the last rump of A once-sprawling “CALIPHATE” THE Group proclaimed in 2014 over parts of Syria and Iraq.
THE SDF KURDISH-ARAB ALLIANCE launched an operation in September to lush out DAESH But THEIR ADVANCE HAS been fraught with obstacles.
The push to retake Hajin was delayed by Turkish threats on Kurdish heartlands Further north AND DEADLY Counter-attacks By DIE-HARD Extremists making A Bloody last stand.
“Now DAESH Is Conined to tunnels AND to the edges of town,” Abdel Rahman said.
“Fighting on the group and air strikes are continuing. The mines planted by the extremists are the main remaining obstacle,” he said.
No casualty toll was immediately AVAILABLE For THE latest IGHTING But ACcording to the Observatory close to 500 SDF ighters HAVE BEEN killed SINCE THE start of the operation on September 10.
Around 300 civilians have also been killed, many of them in coalition air strikes, and thousands have been forced to LEE THEIR Homes.
SEIZURE
Syria’s government has been using a little-known Anti-terrorism law to SEIZE property from dissidents and their families as it takes back control of areas that were held by rebel groups, rights groups and some of the people affected say.
WITH Syria’s Conlict STABILISED, At least for now, and President Bashar AL-ASSAD BACK In Control of THE BIGGEST cities, there is an increasing focus on how he will handle the areas where the 2011 uprising AGAINST HIM LARED.
International attention has focused on policies, such as legislation known as Law 10, that could eventually enable the government to dispossess people in the opposition strongholds worst damaged in the war.
But while Law 10 has not yet been put Into EFFECT, THE separate Anti-terrorism law has already been used to seize property, including from people who had no hand in violence, according to human rights groups.
One man, an architect who joined street protests against Assad early in THE uprising, AND posted Anti-government material online, lost HIS House, OFICE AND farmland in Ghouta in southwestern Syria as well as his car, he said.
“I built my house brick by brick. I built it with my bare hands, tended to every corner and to every inch,” the architect said. He now lives in the northwestern province of IDLIB AFTER LEEING with many other Ghouta residents after its surrender in April.
As they stand to lose property permanently, and because in many cases they have family members still living under government control, none of the six people who spoke to Reuters after being named in seizure orders wanted to BE IDENTIIED.