Tag Archives: Syria

Exclusive: Death certificate offers clues on Russian casualties in Syria

Exclusive: Death certificate offers clues on Russian casualties in Syria

By Maria Tsvetkova

MOSCOW (Reuters) – An official document seen by Reuters shows that at least 131 Russian citizens died in Syria in the first nine months of this year, a number that relatives, friends and local officials say included private military contractors.

The document, a death certificate issued by the Russian consulate in Damascus dated Oct. 4, 2017, does not say what the deceased was doing in Syria.

But Reuters has established in interviews with the families and friends of some of the deceased and officials in their hometowns that the dead included Russian private military contractors killed while fighting alongside the forces of Moscow’s ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The presence of the Russian contractors in Syria – and the casualties they are sustaining – is denied by Moscow, which wants to portray its military intervention in Syria as a successful peace mission with minimal losses.

The Russian defense ministry did not immediately respond to detailed questions submitted by Reuters. Requests for comment from the Russian consulate in Damascus did not elicit a response.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a statement provided to Reuters on Friday: “We do not have information about individual citizens who visit Syria. With that, I consider this question dealt with.”

Reuters sent questions to a group of Russian private military contractors active in Syria through a person who knows their commanders, but did not receive a response.

The official death toll of military personnel in Syria this year is 16. A casualty figure significantly higher than that could tarnish President Vladimir Putin’s record five months before a presidential election which he is expected to contest.

A Reuters count of the number of Russian private contractors known to have been killed in Syria this year, based on interviews with relatives and friends of the dead and local officials in their hometowns, stands at 26.

Russian authorities have not publicly released any information this year about casualties among Russian civilians who may have been caught up in the fighting.

The Russian Foreign Ministry, in response to Reuters questions, said the consulate in Syria was fulfilling its duties to register the deaths of Russian citizens. It said that under the law, personal data obtained in the process of registering the deaths was restricted and could not be publicly disclosed.

In August, Igor Konashenkov, a Russian defense ministry spokesman, said in response to a previous Reuters report that information about Russian military contractors in Syria was “a myth”, and that Reuters was attempting to discredit Moscow’s operation to restore peace in Syria.

UNUSUAL

A Russian diplomat who has worked in a consulate in another part of the world, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media, said the figure of 131 registered deaths in nine months was unusually high given the estimated number of Russian expatriates in Syria.

Although there is no official data for the size of the community, data from Russian national elections shows there were only around 5,000 registered Russian voters in the country in 2012 and 2016.

“It is as if the diaspora is dying out,” he said.

High numbers of deaths are usually recorded by Russian consulates only in tourist destinations such as Thailand or Turkey, he said.

Russian consulates do not register the deaths of military personnel, according to an official at the consulate in Damascus who did not give his name.

The consular document seen by Reuters was a “certificate of death” issued to record the death of Sergei Poddubny, 36. It was one of three death certificates seen by Reuters.

Poddubny’s certificate, which bears the consulate’s stamp, lists the cause of death as “carbonization of the body” – in other words, he was burned.

It said he was killed on Sept. 28 in the town of Tiyas, Homs province, the scene of heavy fighting between Islamist rebels and pro-Assad forces. Several Russian contractors were killed in the area earlier this year, friends and relatives told Reuters.

Poddubny’s body was repatriated and buried in his home village in southern Russia about three weeks later. He had been in Syria as a private military contractor, one of his relatives and one of his friends told Reuters.

Poddubny’s death certificate had a serial number in the top right corner, 131.

Under a Justice Ministry procedure, all death certificates are numbered, starting from zero at the start of the year and going up by one digit for each new death recorded.

The Russian diplomat confirmed that is the procedure.

Reuters saw two other certificates, both issued on Feb. 3. The numbers – 9 and 13 – indicate certificates for at least five deaths were issued on that day. They were both private military contractors, according to people who know them.

The death of a Russian citizen would have to be registered at the consulate in order to repatriate the body back to Russia via civilian channels, according to the Russian diplomat.

A death certificate from the consulate would also help with bureaucracy back home relating to the dead person’s assets, the diplomat said.

The bodies of Russians fighting on the rebel side are not repatriated, according to a former Russian official who dealt with at least six cases of Russians killed in Syria and the relatives of four Russian Islamists killed there.

A few thousand Russian citizens with Islamist sympathies have traveled to rebel-held areas since the conflict began in 2011, according to Russian officials.

(Additional reporting by Andrey Kuzmin; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

No role for Assad in Syria’s future: Tillerson

No role for Assad in Syria's future: Tillerson

By Jonathan Landay

GENEVA (Reuters) – President Bashar al-Assad and his family have no role in the future of Syria, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Thursday ahead of peace talks aiming at a political transition scheduled to resume next month.

Tillerson said that the Trump administration backed the Geneva peace talks as the only way to end the more than six-year-old war and move to a political transition and elections.

He was speaking after holding talks with U.N. Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, who announced that stalled peace talks between the Syrian government and still-to-be-united opposition would resume in Geneva on Nov. 28.

“The United States wants a whole and unified Syria with no role for Bashar al-Assad in the government,” Tillerson told reporters in the Swiss city at the end of a week-long trip that took him to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan and India.

“It is our view and I have said this many times as well that we do not believe that there is a future for the Assad regime and Assad family. The reign of the Assad family is coming to an end. The only issue is how that should that be brought about.”

When the Trump administration came into office it took the view that it was “not a prerequisite that Assad goes” before the transitional process started, he added.

Supported by Russian air power and Iran-backed militias, Assad appears militarily unassailable and last month Assad ally Hezbollah declared victory in the Syrian war.

Those forces have pushed Islamic State back from large swathes of eastern Syria in recent months and over the past year have taken numerous pockets of rebel-held territory around Aleppo, Homs and Damascus.

“My reading is that Assad is here to stay for as long as the Russians and the Iranians have no alternative to him,” a Western diplomat told Reuters. “The date of his departure will depend on the Russians more than anyone else. Once – or if – they find someone better, he may go.”

Ceasefire deals brokered by Russia, Turkey, Iran and the United States in remaining rebel-held areas of western Syria have freed up manpower for Assad’s allies.

Tillerson called his discussions with de Mistura “fruitful” and said the United States will “continue our efforts to de-escalate the violence in Syria”.

He said the only reason Assad’s forces had succeeded in turning the tide in the war against Islamic State and other militants was “air support they have received from Russia”.

Tillerson said Iran, Assad’s other main ally, should not be seen as having made the difference in the defeat of Islamic State in Syria.

“I do not see Syria as a triumph for Iran. I see Iran as a hanger-on. I don’t think that Iran should be given credit for the defeat of ISIS (Islamic State) In Syria. Rather I think they have taken advantage of the situation.”

(Reporting by Jonathan Landay; additonal reporting by Tom Perry in Beiut; writing by Stephanie Nebehay and Lisa Barrington; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Hugh Lawson)

Syrian army captures Islamic State position, eyes final stronghold

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army and its allies seized an oil pumping station in eastern Syria from Islamic State, paving the way for an advance towards the jihadists’ last remaining Syrian stronghold, a Hezbollah-run news service reported on Thursday.

The “T2” pumping station is “considered a launch pad for the army and its allies to advance towards the town of Albu Kamal … which is considered the last remaining stronghold of the Daesh organization in Syria”, the report said.

Albu Kamal is located in Deir al-Zor province at the Syrian border with Iraq, just over the frontier from the Iraqi town of al-Qaim. Iraq declared on Thursday the start of an offensive to capture al-Qaim and Rawa, the last patch of Iraqi territory still in IS hands.

Islamic State’s self-declared “caliphate” has crumbled this year with the fall of the Syrian city of Raqqa and the Iraqi city of Mosul. In Syria, the group is now mostly confined to a shrinking strip of territory in Deir al-Zor province.

The U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State is waging a separate campaign against the group in Deir al-Zor, focused on areas to the east of the Euphrates River which bisects the province. Albu Kamal is located on the western bank of the river.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Kremlin says Putin, Erdogan discuss Syria in phone call

Kremlin says Putin, Erdogan discuss Syria in phone call

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan discussed an upcoming meeting of the Astana process on the Syrian conflict in the Kazakh capital in late October, the Kremlin said on Saturday.

During their phone conversation, Putin and Erdogan talked about joint efforts within the Astana process, including the creation of “de-escalation zones” in Syria, and further coordination towards resolving the Syria situation, the Kremlin said in a statement.

The Astana talks are brokered by Russia, Turkey and Iran. In mid-September, the three countries agreed to post observers on the edge of a de-escalation zone in northern Syria’s Idlib region largely controlled by Islamist militants.

Putin and Erdogan also said the agreements reached between Russia and Turkey in Ankara in late September were being successfully implemented, particularly in trade and economic relations.

“Overall, the conversation was business-like and constructive, directed at strengthening bilateral cooperation and interaction on the regional agenda,” the Kremlin said.

The Russian-Turkish trade relationship has been affected by their dispute over supplies of Turkish tomatoes to Russia which Moscow is yet to fully restore. This dispute has been adding risks to Russian grain trade with Turkey.

Russia, once the largest market for Turkish tomato producers, said this week it will allow purchases of 50,000 tonnes of Turkish tomatoes from only four Turkish producers from Dec. 1.

The announcement came several days after Turkey, the second largest buyer of Russian wheat, said it had imposed a requirement for additional approval of Russian agriculture supplies by the Turkish authorities.

(Reporting by Polina Devitt)

Israel says it will intensify response to Syrian fire

Israel says it will intensify response to Syrian fire

JERUSALEM/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Five projectiles from Syria set off air raid sirens in Israeli towns on Saturday, prompting the Israeli military to say it would step up its response to stray fire from the Syrian war that has repeatedly spilled over the border.

The projectiles crossed into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and the military said it targeted three Syrian artillery guns in response. No damage or injuries were reported in Israel.

The Syrian military said it came under attack in Quneitra province, which sits near the Golan Heights territory that Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Middle East War.

“The Israeli enemy assaulted one of our military positions this morning, which led to material damages,” it said.

During Syria’s more than six-year-old conflict, Israel has returned fire across the border, including stray shells from fighting among Syrian combatants.

The Israeli military statement suggested it may start escalating such retaliations. “Whether errant fire or not, any future occurrences will force the Israel Defense Forces to intensify its response,” it said.

Israel “holds the Syrian regime responsible and won’t tolerate any attempt to breach Israeli sovereignty,” it added.

Syria’s foreign ministry warned of “the grave consequences of such repeated aggressive acts” which it called a flagrant violation in a letter to the United Nations, state media said. The Syrian military said it held Israel responsible.

Israel has also carried out targeted air strikes in Syria during the war, alarmed by the expanding influence of Iran, the Syrian government’s ally. The Israeli air force says it has struck arms convoys of the Syrian military and Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah nearly 100 times in recent years.

Iran’s military chief warned Israel against breaching Syria’s airspace and territory on a visit to Damascus this week. The general signed an agreement with his Syrian counterpart to further boost military cooperation, Iranian state news agency IRNA said on Saturday.

Rebel factions fighting the Damascus government in the multi-sided war hold swathes of Quneitra, while the army and allied militias control another part of the province.

Both warring Syrian sides accused each other of prompting the Israeli attack on Saturday.

The army said militants in nearby territory fired mortar rounds into the Golan Heights. A rebel official in Quneitra said pro-government fighters had been shelling insurgent-held parts of the province, when some of the shells fell on the Golan Heights.

(Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem and Ellen Francis in Beirut, Additional reporting by Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman, Editing by Stephen Powell)

From Damascus, Iran vows to confront Israel

From Damascus, Iran vows to confront Israel

By Ellen Francis and Babak Dehghanpisheh

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Iran’s military chief warned Israel against breaching Syrian airspace and territory on a visit to Damascus on Wednesday, raising tensions with Israel as it voices deep concern over Tehran’s influence in Syria.

General Mohammad Baqeri pledged to increase cooperation with Syria’s military to fight Israel and insurgents, Iranian and Syrian state media said.

Iranian forces and Iran-backed Shi’ite militias, including Hezbollah, have provided critical military support to Damascus, helping it regain swathes of Syria from rebels and militants.

“It’s not acceptable for the Zionist regime to violate the land and airspace of Syria anytime it wants,” Baqeri said at a news conference with his Syrian counterpart.

“We are in Damascus to assert and cooperate to confront our common enemies, the Zionists and terrorists,” he said, a reference to Israel and Sunni Muslim jihadists including Islamic State.

“We drew up the broad lines for this cooperation,” Syrian state media cited the Iranian military chief of staff as saying.

Iran’s expanding clout during Syria’s more than six-year war has raised alarm in Israel, which has said it would act against any threat from its regional arch-enemy Tehran.

Israel’s air force says it has struck arms convoys of the Syrian military and Hezbollah nearly 100 times during the war.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that Iran was strengthening its foothold in Syria and that Israel would “do whatever it takes” to protect its security.

Tensions have risen this year between Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Israel, which have avoided a major conflict since 2006.

This week, the Israeli military said it attacked a Syrian anti-aircraft battery that had fired at its planes over Lebanon. But the Syrian army said it hit an Israeli warplane after it breached its airspace at the Syria-Lebanon border. [nL8N1MR2EX

“Our job is to prevent war, and you do that through deterrence. What we saw in Syria (on Monday) fell within this framework,” the Israeli defense minister told Israel Radio on Wednesday before the Iranian military chief’s comments.

“We will do whatever is necessary for (our) security,” Avigdor Lieberman added. “We will not change our operating procedures because of shooting or a threat of this type or another.”

(Additional reporting by Jeffrey Heller in Jerusalem; Editing by Tom Perry and Richard Balmforth)

U.S., Russia set for likely U.N. row over Syria toxic gas inquiry

FILE PHOTO: A United Nations (U.N.) chemical weapons expert, wearing a gas mask, holds a plastic bag containing samples from one of the sites of an alleged chemical weapons attack in the Ain Tarma neighbourhood of Damascus, Syria August 29, 2013. REUTERS/Mohamed Abdullah/File Photo

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United States said on Wednesday it would push the United Nations Security Council to renew within days an international inquiry into who is to blame for chemical weapons attacks in Syria, setting the stage for a likely showdown with Russia.

Russia has questioned the work and future of the joint inquiry by the U.N. and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), and said it would decide whether to support extending the mandate after investigators submit their next report.

The inquiry, known as the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM), is due to report by Oct. 26 on who was responsible for an April 4 attack on the opposition-held town of Khan Sheikhoun that killed dozens of people.

“We would like to see it renewed prior to the report coming out,” U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley told reporters.

“The Russians have made it very clear that should the report blame the Syrians suddenly they won’t have faith in the JIM. If the report doesn’t blame the Syrians then they say that they will. We can’t work like that,” Haley said.

A separate OPCW fact-finding mission determined in June that the banned nerve agent sarin had been used in the Khan Sheikhoun attack, which prompted the United States to launch missiles on a Syrian air base.

Haley said she would circulate a draft resolution to the 15-member Security Council later on Wednesday to renew the mandate for the JIM, which is due to expire in mid-November. It was unanimously created by the council in 2015 and renewed in 2016.

A resolution must get nine votes in favor and not be vetoed by any of the council’s five permanent members – Russia, China, the United States, Britain and France – in order to pass.

The JIM has found that Syrian government forces were responsible for three chlorine gas attacks in 2014 and 2015 and that Islamic State militants used mustard gas.

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Russia and the United States. The Syrian government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons during a civil war that has lasted more than six years.

Mikhail Ulyanov, director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s non-proliferation and arms control department, said on Friday there were “serious problems” with the work of the inquiry.

“In order to judge if it deserves an extension of the mandate, we need to see the report … and assess it,” Ulyanov told a briefing at the United Nations to present Moscow’s view on the “Syrian chemical dossier.”

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Paul Simao)

U.S.-backed campaign against IS in eastern Syria to speed up: SDF militia

A view of a part of downtown Raqqa after it was liberated from the Islamic State militants, in Raqqa, Syria October 17, 2017. Picture taken October 17, 2017. REUTERS/Erik De Castro

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A U.S.-backed campaign against Islamic State in eastern Syria will accelerate now the jihadist group has been defeated in its former capital Raqqa, a spokesman for U.S.-allied Syrian militias said on Wednesday.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which announced the defeat at Raqqa on Tuesday, will redeploy fighters from the city to frontlines with Islamic State in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor, Talal Silo told Reuters by telephone.

The SDF is fighting Islamic State in Deir al-Zor in areas to the east of the Euphrates River. The Syrian government, supported by the Russian air force and Iran-backed militias, is waging a separate campaign against the jihadists in the province, focused mostly in areas to the west of the river.

Islamic State has lost ground rapidly there in recent weeks. The Syrian army and its allies are battling for control of the last remaining IS-held areas of Deir al-Zor city, and have also captured the town of al-Mayadin from IS.

Silo said the Raqqa victory would have a “positive impact” on the SDF’s campaign in Deir al-Zor because it meant fighters could be redeployed as internal security forces take control of Raqqa.

“Most of the military forces will head towards these areas to continue the participation in the campaign with the Deir al-Zor Military Council,” he said. The Council is a militia leading the SDF’s campaign in the province.

“This is all to the benefit of the campaign and accelerating the end of this campaign,” he said.

(Reporting by Tom Perry; editing by John Stonestreet)

Islamic State defeated in its Syrian capital Raqqa

Islamic State defeated in its Syrian capital Raqqa

By John Davison and Rodi Said

RAQQA, Syria (Reuters) – U.S.-backed militias said they had defeated Islamic State in its former capital Raqqa on Tuesday, raising their flags over the jihadist group’s last footholds in the city after a four-month battle.

The fighting was over but the alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias was clearing the stadium of mines and any remaining militants, said Rojda Felat, commander of the Raqqa campaign for the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

A formal declaration of victory in Raqqa will soon be made, once the city has been cleared of mines and any possible Islamic State sleeper cells, said Talal Silo, the SDF spokesman.

The fall of Raqqa, where Islamic State staged euphoric parades after its string of lightning victories in 2014, is a potent symbol of the jihadist movement’s collapsing fortunes.

Islamic State has lost most of its territory in Syria and Iraq this year, including its most prized possession, Mosul. In Syria, it has been forced back into a strip of the Euphrates valley and surrounding desert.

The SDF, backed by a U.S.-led international alliance, has been fighting since June to take the city Islamic State used to plan attacks abroad.

Another Reuters witness said militia fighters celebrated in the streets, chanting slogans from their vehicles.

The fighters and commanders clasped their arms round each other, smiling, in a battle-scarred landscape of rubble and ruined buildings at a public square.

The flags in the stadium and others waved in the city streets were of the SDF, its strongest militia the Kurdish YPG, and the YPG’s female counterpart, the YPJ.

Fighters hauled down the black flag of Islamic State, the last still flying over the city, from the National Hospital near the stadium.

“We do still know there are still IEDs and booby traps in and amongst the areas that ISIS once held, so the SDF will continue to clear deliberately through areas,” said Colonel Ryan Dillon, a spokesman for the coalition.

In a sign that the four-month battle for Raqqa had been in its last stages, Dillon said there were no coalition air strikes there on Monday.

TRAPPED BY FIGHTING

Fatima Hussein, a 58-year-old woman, sitting on a pavement smoking a cigarette said she had emerged from her house after being trapped for months by the fighting. Islamic State had killed her son for helping civilians leave the city, she said.

The SDF, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias, took the National Hospital in fierce fighting overnight and early on Tuesday, said spokesman Mostafa Bali in a statement.

“During these clashes, the National Hospital was liberated and cleared from the Daesh mercenaries, and 22 of these foreign mercenaries were killed there,” said Bali, using the Arabic acronym for Islamic State.

An SDF field commander who gave his name as Ager Ozalp said three militiamen had been killed on Monday by mines that have become an Islamic State trademark in its urban battles.

Another field commander, who gave his name as Abjal al-Syriani, said SDF fighters had found burned weapons and documents in the stadium.

The stadium and hospital became the last major positions held by Islamic State after the departure of some of its fighters on Sunday, leaving only foreign jihadists to mount a last stand.

The SDF has been supported by a U.S.-led international coalition with air strikes and special forces on the ground since it started the battle for Raqqa city in early June.

The final SDF assault began on Sunday after a group of Syrian jihadists quit the city under a deal with tribal elders, leaving only a hardcore of up to 300 fighters to defend the last positions.

PASSPORTS AND MONEY

Raqqa was the first big city Islamic State captured in early 2014, before its rapid series of victories in Iraq and Syria brought millions of people under the rule of its self-declared caliphate, which passed laws and issued passports and money.

It used the city as a planning and operations centre for its warfare in the Middle East and its string of attacks overseas, and for a time imprisoned Western hostages there before killing them in slickly produced films distributed online.

The SDF advance since Sunday also brought it control over a central city roundabout, where Islamic State once displayed the severed heads of its enemies, and which became one of its last lines of defence as the battle progressed.

The offensive has pushed Islamic State from most of northern Syria, while a rival offensive by the Syrian army, backed by Russia, Iran and Shi’ite militias, has driven the jihadists from the central desert.

On Tuesday, a military media unit run by Lebanon’s Hezbollah group said the Syrian army on whose side Hezbollah fights had pushed into the last Islamic State districts in Deir al-Zor.

The only populated areas still controlled by the jihadist group in Syria are the towns and villages downstream of Deir al-Zor along the Euphrates valley. They are areas that for the past three years Islamic State ran from Raqqa.

(Additional reporting by Ellen Francis and Dahlia Nehme in Beirut; Writing by Angus McDowall in Beirut; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)

Islamic State faces imminent Raqqa defeat, Syrian YPG says

By John Davison and Tom Perry

AIN ISSA, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Islamic State is on the verge of defeat in Raqqa, once its de facto Syrian capital, and the city may finally be cleared of the jihadists on Saturday or Sunday, the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia told Reuters.

A local official said tribal elders were seeking to broker a deal where remaining Islamic State fighters, including foreigners, would leave the city, taking civilians with them as human shields.

The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), backed by air strikes and special forces from a U.S.-led international coalition, have been battling since June to oust Islamic State from Raqqa, a base that it had used to plan attacks against the West.

The retaking of Raqqa will be a major milestone in efforts to roll back the theocratic “caliphate” that Islamic State declared in Syria and Iraq, where earlier this year it was driven from the city of Mosul.

“The battles are continuing in Raqqa city,” YPG spokesman Nouri Mahmoud, whose group dominates the SDF, told Reuters by telephone. “Daesh (Islamic State) is on the verge of being finished. Today or tomorrow, the city may be liberated.”

The U.S.-led coalition said a convoy was set to depart Raqqa on Saturday under an arrangement brokered by local officials.

Its statement said the coalition was not involved in the discussions, and described the arrangement as “a civilian evacuation”.

Its spokesman, Col. Ryan Dillon, said the coalition’s stance was that IS fighters must surrender unconditionally, but added that he could not comment on who would be in the convoy. He said difficult fighting was expected in the days ahead.

“SAVING INNOCENT LIVES”

The coalition statement said the arrangement brokered by the Raqqa Civil Council and local Arab tribal elders on Oct. 12 was “designed to minimize civilian casualties and purportedly excludes foreign Daesh terrorists”.

The coalition believed the arrangement would “save innocent lives and allow Syrian Democratic Forces and the coalition to focus on defeating Daesh terrorists in Raqqa with less risk of civilian casualties”, it said.

Omar Alloush, a member of the Raqqa Civil Council, set up to run Raqqa after it is freed from IS, said the 100 Islamic State fighters who had already surrendered had been convinced to do so during talks with the tribal elders.

“Others didn’t surrender, so now they’re looking for a plan where they (IS) leave and take civilian hostages with them to another place far from the city, and then release the civilians,” he told Reuters in an interview in Ain Issa, north of Raqqa. The IS fighters would go to remaining territory held by the group in Syria, he said.

The deal could happen as soon as Saturday, he said.

A tribal leader said he expected the evacuation to take place on Saturday or Sunday.

BUSES ARRIVE

An activist group that reports on Raqqa, Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, said on its Facebook page that dozens of buses had entered Raqqa city overnight from the countryside to the north.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based organization that reports on the war, said Syrian Islamic State fighters and their families had already left the city, and buses had arrived to evacuate remaining foreign fighters and their families.

The Syrian army, which is supported by Iran-backed militias and the Russian air force, declared another significant victory over Islamic State on Saturday, saying it had captured the town of al-Mayadin in Deir al-Zor province.

The eastern province is Islamic State’s last major foothold in Syria, and it is under attack there from the SDF on one side and Syrian government forces supported by Iran-backed militias and Russian air strikes on the other.

Islamic State fighters had previously agreed to an evacuation last August, from an area on the Syrian-Lebanese border.

But as their convoy moved towards Islamic State-held territory in eastern Syria, coalition planes blocked its route by cratering roads, destroying bridges and attacking nearby Islamic State vehicles.

(Reporting by Lisa Barrington and Tom Perry in Beirut; Editing by Kevin Liffey)