UK PM visits SBAs
BRITISH Prime Minister Theresa May yesterday paid a surprised pre-Christmas visit to British forces in Cyprus, telling them they should be proud of helping to crush the caliphate declared by the militants of Islamic State.
Speaking at the South’s RAF Akrotiri base, Mrs May said facilities on the island were the “epicentre” of operations against Islamic State (IS), which she called “Daesh”.
“Today, thanks in very large part to your efforts, the so-called Caliphate has been crushed, and no longer holds significant territory in Iraq or Syria,” she told about 200 members of the armed forces.
“You should be incredibly proud of that achievement.”
Akrotiri, near Limassol, has been used as a staging post for attacks against IS, now largely defeated after attempting to set up a radical theocratic state or caliphate across swathes of Iraq and Syria.
“We need to continue to deal directly with the threat they still pose in the region,” Mrs May added, standing in front of a Tornado and a Typhoon fighter jet parked outside a hangar.
“We also need to focus on training the Iraqi security forces so they can keep Daesh out.”
May later met with families of Britain’s roughly 3,100 military personnel stationed at Akrotiri and its other military base at Dhekelia. The UK retained sovereignty over about 98 square miles, or 3 per cent, of the island’s territory after granting independence to its former colony in 1960.
RAF Akrotiri hosts an Expeditionary Airforce Wing that supports operation Shader, Britain’s codename for attacks on IS targets in Iraq. More than 1,600 air strikes on Islamic State targets have been launched from the facility since 2015 as part of a campaign by a US-led multinational coalition. May’s deputy forced to quit in porn scandal, page 23