Syria: 9 pro-regime soldiers killed in Islamic State attack

Nine pro-regime fighters were killed and 15 others wounded in an attack by the Islamic State (IS) group on a military convoy in eastern Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on Monday (January 3rd) ( OSDH).

According to OSDH, a UK-based NGO with an extensive network of sources in Syria, nine Syrian army soldiers and militiamen affiliated with the regime were killed in an ambush by ISIS against a military convoy.

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The attack occurred Sunday evening near oil installations in a desert area in eastern Syria, according to the NGO. For its part, a military source from the state agency SANA reported five deaths. This attack was not immediately claimed by ISIS, which carried out several similar operations in this oil-rich region once at the heart of its proto-state, which stretched over large swathes of Syrian and Iraqi territory. In early December, 10 oil workers were killed in a similar attack on a bus in this region. The IS group's self-proclaimed caliphate was declared definitively defeated after a long offensive in March 2019, but the group continues to harass government forces in the vast Syrian desert.

Since March 24, 2019, the OSDH has reported 1,790 pro-regime soldiers and militiamen killed in offensives, attacks and ambushes carried out by ISIS.

Russia, an ally of the Syrian regime, has carried out intense air raids targeting IS positions in the Syrian desert in recent days, reports this NGO.

The war in Syria has claimed an estimated 500,000 lives, devastated the country's infrastructure and displaced millions of people since it began in 2011.