Daesh on the run as stronghold Raqqa’s fall nears

KOBANE/BEIRUT: Dozens of Daesh terrorists have surrendered in their former Syrian stronghold of Raqqa, the US-led coalition said Saturday, as the fall of the one-time militant bastion nears.
Meanwhile, troops of the Syrian regime and allied forces captured the city of Mayadeen from Daesh, state media said.
A monitor said no Syrian members of the terrorist group remained in Raqqa, and that negotiations on the fate of foreign fighters were ongoing. But the US-led coalition backing the offensive insisted that foreign fighters would not be allowed to leave the city.
Raqqa was once the de facto Syrian capital of the Daesh’s self-proclaimed “caliphate” straddling Iraq and Syria.
The city’s loss would be the latest in a string of heavy blows for Daesh, which has already been driven from its strongholds in Iraq including Mosul.
In June, the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, broke into Raqqa, and since then they have captured around 90 percent of the city.
In recent days, talks had been underway on a deal to secure the last parts of Raqqa while protecting trapped civilians, some of them being used by Daesh fighters as human shields.
On Saturday, the US-led coalition confirmed dozens of Daesh fighters had handed themselves in.
Earlier, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor of the war, reported that all the remaining Syrian Daesh members in the city had now left with their families.
“All Syrian fighters from the Islamic State (Daesh) group left Raqqa over the past five days,” said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman, saying they numbered around 200.
A Raqqa official told AFP on Saturday that Syrian Daesh members had surrendered overnight to the SDF, without specifying how many.
“They sent a message to the Raqqa Civil Council (RCC) and to the tribal mediators,” the official said.
“Those that surrendered are local, not foreigners — the foreigners have not handed themselves in yet,” he said.
An SDF military source told AFP that buses and trucks were waiting outside Raqqa and would take the surrendered fighters further east to Deir Ezzor province, much of which remains under Daesh control.
Members of the RCC had been working with tribal leaders throughout the week to try to secure safe passage for civilians. Up to 1,500 civilians have managed to flee the battle-ravaged city in the past week, according to the coalition. The UN estimates thousands more may still be trapped inside.
Abdel Rahman said up to 150 foreign militants remain in Raqqa and negotiations on their fate were ongoing.
“The foreign fighters are asking to leave in one group toward areas under Daesh control in Deir Ezzor province,” in eastern Syria, he said.
Nuri Mahmud, a spokesman for the key Kurdish People’s Protection Units that forms the SDF’s backbone, denied that any deal would be cut with Daesh.
On Saturday, another Daesh stronghold in the country’s east fell to the Syrian regime forces and their allies.
“Units of our armed forces, in cooperation with allied forces, have regained control of the city of Mayadeen in Deir Ezzor, killing a large number of terrorists and destroying their weapons,” state media said, citing a military source.
“Our units are chasing down remaining members of Daesh fleeing the city amid a collapse in their ranks, and the engineering units are removing mines and explosives planted by the terrorists in the streets and square of the city,” the source added.
Over the past months, Mayadeen had become a refugee for the Daesh leadership from Syria and Iraq as its self-proclaimed caliphate crumbled. The town, on the western bank of the Euphrates River, was also a major node in the race for control of the oil-rich eastern Deir Ezzor.