Russian bombers strike
MOSCOW, Nov 4, (Agencies): Russian Tu-22M3 long-range bombers struck Islamic State targets near the town of Albu Kamal in Syria on Saturday, RIA news agency reported, citing Russia’s Defence Ministry.
Command centres and weapon depots were among the targets hit by the bombers which flew over Iran and Iraq.
Meanwhile, Syrian and allied forces converged Saturday on holdout Islamic State group fighters in Albu Kamal, the jihadists’ very last urban bastion following a string of losses.
On Friday, Russian-backed Syrian regime forces took full control of Deir Ezzor, which was the last city where IS still had a presence after being expelled from Hawija and Raqqa last month.
The borders of a “caliphate” that three years ago spanned territory in Iraq and Syria roughly the size of Britain further shrank on the group’s surviving fighters when Iraqi forces retook Al-Qaim, also on Friday.
The town lies along the Euphrates River in western Iraq and faces Albu Kamal, which is where many of IS’s remaining fighters are thought to have regrouped.
The Syrian army and allied militia groups were still some 30 kms (nearly 20 miles) from Albu Kamal, but Iraqi paramilitaries crossed the border to take on IS, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
“Fighting pitted Hashed al-Shaabi units against the Islamic State in the Hiri area,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Britainbased monitor.
Hiri, just across the border from Al-Qaim, on the outskirts of Albu Kamal, is now the last town of note still fully controlled by
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s jihadist group.
Abdel Rahman said IS was able to pin back the Iraqi forces.
The Hashed al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilisation) are a paramilitary umbrella dominated by Shiite militia outfits loyal to Tehran.
The Syrian regime forces, backed by intensive Russian air strikes, are advancing on Albu Kamal from an oil pumping station in the desert west of the town.
Kurdish-led US-backed fighters from the Syrian Democratic Forces were making fresh gains further north in Syria’s eastern province of Deir Ezzor, the Observatory said.
The offensives were more simultaneous than coordinated in the border area, where the myriad armed forces involved in the anti-IS fight support conflicting agendas.
The Euphrates Valley border area was the heart of the “caliphate” IS proclaimed in 2014 and is now its last redoubt, where a US-led coalition supporting the military effort said around 1,500 jihadist fighters remained.