Category Archives: Syria

Earthquake in Turkey and Syria kills thousands and devastates cities

Posted on by

7.8-magnitude tremor hit early on Monday, with second major quake mid-morning hampering rescue efforts

More than 2,000 people were killed when an earthquake struck central Turkey and north-west Syria, in one of the most powerful quakes in the region in at least a century, while a second powerful tremor hours later threatened to overwhelm rescue efforts.

Thousands more were injured as the quake wiped out entire sections of major cities in a region filled with millions of people who have fled the civil war in Syria.

Continue reading...

Syrian regime found responsible for Douma chemical attack

Posted on by

Watchdog report follows years-long investigation into strike that killed 43 civilians in Damascus suburb

Investigators from the global chemical weapons agency have found the Syrian regime responsible for a poison gas attack that killed 43 people in a suburb of Damascus in 2018, leaving victims choking to death in the basement of a home.

In a report nearly five in the making, the Organisation for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) found the canisters carrying poison gas had been dropped by a Syrian air force helicopter over Douma – then one of the last opposition strongholds near the Syrian capital.

Continue reading...

Ukraine war pushes civilian casualties from explosive weapons to four-year high

Posted on by

Reported casualties in Ukraine were eight times more than Afghanistan – and real figure likely to be much higher

Civilian casualties from the use of explosive weapons soared by 83% last year because of the war in Ukraine, according to a monitoring organisation that counts the number of deaths caused by conflict and war.

Action on Armed Violence (AOVA) said the total number reported killed and injured in 2022 was 20,776, the highest level since 2018, with 10,381 casualties in Ukraine alone, based on reports from English language media.

Continue reading...

NSW woman Mariam Raad granted bail after being charged with entering Islamic State territory

Posted on by

Raad, who was repatriated from Syria to Australia in 2022, was forced to surrender her passport and will appear at court again in March

A New South Wales woman who was repatriated to Australia from a Syrian refugee camp has been granted bail after being charged with entering and remaining in parts of Syria that were under Islamic State control.

Mariam Raad, 31, was arrested on Thursday in Young, in the state’s southwest, where she had been living since being returned in October.

Continue reading...

Turkish and Syrian defence and security officials meet for first time in a decade

Posted on by

Move towards peaceful relations represents cause for alarm for more than 4m refugees in Turkey since 2011

Top Turkish and Syrian defence and security officials have held their first public meeting in more than a decade, in a dramatic shift towards normalising relations between the two countries after Ankara backed rebels during Syria’s civil war.

The Turkish defence minister, Hulusi Akar, and the head of the country’s national intelligence organisation (MIT), Hakan Fidan, met the Syrian defence minister, Ali Mahmoud Abbas, and the notorious spy chief Ali Mamlouk in Moscow, in a meeting attended by the Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu.

Continue reading...

First refugees arrive in tiny Catalan villages under repopulation plan

Posted on by

Orwa Skafe, who fled Syria seven years ago, is among those given jobs and a home in attempt to revive rural areas

It’s been a long journey since Orwa Skafe fled the war in Syria seven years ago but thanks to an innovative resettlement scheme he’s found peace in a tiny village 900 metres (3,000ft) up in the Pyrenees. He is one of the first to benefit from a Catalan government programme to relocate refugees in depopulated villages.

The programme, called Operation 500 because it involves villages with fewer than 500 inhabitants, is being run jointly by the regional employment agency, the equality commission and the Association of Micro-villages.

Continue reading...

Protester killed in raid on Syrian government building in Sweida

Posted on by

Police officer also dies during clashes amid claims security forces fired live ammunition on protesters

A protester and a police officer have been killed during an anti-government demonstration in Syria’s Druze-majority Sweida province.

Seven people were wounded during the incident on Sunday, at a rare protest in the country where President Bashar al-Assad stamped out a pro-democracy uprising over a decade ago. Assad survived the resulting civil war but the conflict has plunged Syria into poverty, coupled with a food security and energy crisis.

Continue reading...

Third Islamic State leader killed in battle

Posted on by

White House welcomes news of Abu al-Hasan al-Hashimi al-Qurashi’s death

The Islamic State jihadist group said its leader has been killed in battle, the third head of the violent extremist faction to have met a violent death.

A spokesperson for the group said Abu al-Hasan al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, an Iraqi, was killed “in combat with enemies of God”, without elaborating on the date of his death or the circumstances.

Continue reading...

‘Desensitised’ ex-IS followers remain threats, Shamima Begum hearing told

Posted on by

Home Office argues people trafficked to Syria were exposed to extreme violence which poses ‘almighty problem’

People trafficked to Syria and radicalised remain threats to national security as they may be desensitised after exposure to extreme violence, the Home Office has argued, in contesting Shamima Begum’s appeal against the removal of her British citizenship.

Begum was 15 when she travelled from her home in Bethnal Green, east London, through Turkey and into territory controlled by Islamic State (IS). After she was found, nine months pregnant in a Syrian refugee camp in February 2019, the then home secretary, Sajid Javid, revoked her British citizenship on national security grounds.

Continue reading...

Iran blames Israel after bomb kills Revolutionary Guard colonel in Syria

Posted on by

Davoud Jafari and his bodyguard reportedly targeted by roadside bomb near Damascus

An improvised bomb has killed an Iranian colonel from the aerospace division of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps near Syria’s capital, Damascus, Iranian media reported, blaming Israel for the attack.

The Islamic republic regularly calls for the destruction of the Jewish state, which in turn sees Iran, with its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes and its regional proxies, as its biggest security threat.

Continue reading...

Police should have helped Shamima Begum return to UK, court told

Posted on by

Tribunal hears there were grounds to suspect the then 15-year-old had been groomed as a child bride

Police should have helped Shamima Begum return to Britain after she joined Islamic State in Syria because there were grounds to suspect she had been groomed as a child bride, a court has heard.

Samantha Knights KC told a tribunal that the police had an obligation to investigate whether Begum, who was 15 when she left the UK, was a victim of human trafficking, and then help her return if she was.

Continue reading...

How airstrikes by Israel, Turkey and Russia denote a new era in Syrian war

Posted on by

Regional interests remain very much at stake in conflict neither isolated, nor solely Syrian – though often forgotten

Over the plains of northern Syria, an approaching warplane usually makes a distinctive roar, allowing those on the ground to determine who it belongs to and whether there’s a need to hide.

But the past few days have been more onerous than ever for plane-spotters as the air forces of three countries have crisscrossed Syrian skies, bombing targets from the Mediterranean coast to the deserts of the east in the most comprehensive airstrikes in the past three years.

Continue reading...

Turkey confirms deadly airstrikes in Syria and Iraq targeting Kurdish groups

Posted on by

Strikes launched in retaliation for Istanbul bombing target ‘terrorist bases’, but civilian deaths reported by Kurdish officials

Turkey launched deadly airstrikes over northern regions of Syria and Iraq, the Turkish defence ministry said on Sunday, targeting Kurdish groups that Ankara holds responsible for last week’s bomb attack in Istanbul.

Warplanes attacked bases belonging to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), and the Syrian People’s Protection Units, or YPG, the ministry said in a statement, which was accompanied by images of F-16 jets taking off and footage of a strike from an aerial drone.

Continue reading...

Turkey bombs towns across northern Syria after Istanbul bombing, say reports

Posted on by

Airstrikes reported against towns including Kobane, held by Kurdish militia opposed by Turkey

Turkish airstrikes hit several towns across northern Syria, including the city of Kobane late on Saturday, Kurdish-led forces and a Britain-based monitoring group have said.

The attacks come days after Ankara blamed the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) for last Sunday’s deadly bombing in central Istanbul.

Continue reading...

Dozens of countries sign deal to curb bombing in urban areas

Posted on by

Campaigners hope agreement will change military norms, though it was not endorsed by countries including Russia, Israel and China

Eighty countries led by the US, UK and France have signed a declaration in Dublin pledging to refrain from urban bombing, the first time countries have agreed to curb the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

The international agreement is a product of more than three years of negotiation – predating the war in Ukraine – but was not endorsed by several major military powers, including Russia, China, Israel and India.

Continue reading...

Arrest of mafia drug-trafficker on Europol’s most wanted list shrouded in mystery

Posted on by

Bruno Carbone, right-hand man of mafia boss Raffaele Imperiale, was arrested at Rome airport amid claims he was extradited from Syria

The arrest of an Italian drug trafficker who was on Europol’s most wanted list is shrouded in mystery amid reports that he was captured and extradited from Syria.

Bruno Carbone, who had been on the run since 2003, was the right-hand man of Raffaele Imperiale, a drug broker for the Naples’ Camorra mafia who was arrested in Dubai in August 2021.

Continue reading...

Syrian amnesties freed less than 6% of detainees, report reveals

Posted on by

Freeing of prisoners hailed as acts of benevolence by Assad regime still leave estimated 136,000 people in jail

Prisoner amnesties decreed by the Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad, during the country’s 10-year war have freed less than 6% of detainees, with an estimated 136,000 people remaining in state prisons, a report has revealed.

The amnesties, which were hailed as acts of benevolence by officials and Assad, have put barely a dent in the huge numbers still held in the regime’s infamous prison systems, some for years after their sentences had expired.

Continue reading...

Kurdish militants deny Turkish claims they carried out Istanbul attack

Posted on by

Armed wing of PKK party says it would not target civilians after bomb leaves six dead and 81 injured

The armed wing of the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) has denied any role in an attack on a main Istanbul shopping street, shortly after Turkish officials blamed Kurdish militants for the deadly blast.

Six people died and 81 were injured when a bomb struck Istanbul’s popular pedestrian thoroughfare İstiklal Avenue, timed to strike when it was most crowded. Turkey’s justice minister, Bekir Bozdağ, said that “a woman sat on a bench there for 45 minutes”, and that the explosion occurred moments after she left.

Continue reading...

Iran and Russia find common ground through Syrian and Ukraine wars

Posted on by

Tehran’s supply of drones to Moscow deepens a collaboration between two unlikely allies

When a Russian plane arrived in Iran with €140m in cash and a booty of captured western weapons, an exchange for Iranian drones, it marked a new phase in a seven-year alliance between two unlikely bedfellows.

The delivery of cash and weapons was reportedly made in August, after Russia received its first deliveries of drones to support its war in Ukraine. It was Iran’s first known contribution to the Russian offensive in Europe. But the bond between the two countries had been forged on another continent ravaged by war, the Middle East.

Continue reading...

American woman who led Islamic State battalion in Syria sentenced to 20 years

Posted on by

Allison Fluke-Ekren’s children told the court that their mother had a ‘lust for control and power’ and deserved the maximum sentence

A Kansas woman who led an all-female Islamic State battalion when she lived in Syria has been sentenced to 20 years in prison – the maximum possible sentence – after her own children denounced her in court and detailed the horrific circumstances and abuse she heaped on them.

Allison Fluke-Ekren, 42, admitted that she led the Khatiba Nusaybah, a battalion in which roughly 100 women and girls – some as young as 10 years old – learned how to use automatic weapons and detonate grenades and suicide belts.

Continue reading...