ANKARA
Daesh has seized more than 50 percent of Syria and is now present in 10 out of 14 provinces in the country, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Thursday.
The reported data came after Daesh took full control of Tadmur city, including the Palmyra world heritage site in Homs province.
“[Daesh controls] more than 95,000 square kilometers in Syria and exists in the provinces of Homs, al- Raqqa, Deir Ezzor, al- Hasakah, Hama, Aleppo, Damascus, Rif Dimashq, Daraa and al-Suwaydaa,” the U.K.-based observatory said.
The statement added that Daesh also controls the majority of gas and oilfields in Syria.
In Washington, the State Department denied the accuracy of the observatory’s claims.
“We certainly don't deny that ISIL holds significant territory in Syria, but we don't agree with those calculations,” spokeswoman Marie Harf said using a different acronym for Daesh. She stopped short, however, of outlining Washington’s view of the amount of territory the group controls in Syria.
Syrian regime loses to Daesh border crossing with Iraq
Daesh has seized control of the al-Tanaf border crossing on the Syrian-Iraqi border after Bashar al-Assad regime forces withdrew from the area, an Iraqi government official said Thursday.
The al-Tanaf border crossing is also known as the al-Walid crossing on the Iraqi side and is one of three Syrian-Iraqi border crossings.
“Before withdrawing from the border crossing, the al-Tanaf employees and regime forces set it on fire to destroy all facilities there,” an Iraqi government official at the crossing told Anadolu Agency.
About the traffic on the border crossing before it was burnt down, the source said: “Some Iraqi militia fighters had used it to cross into Syria a year ago to fight alongside the Syrian regime forces against the opposition forces… some trucks recently also came from Syria to Rutba city on the Iraqi side [controlled by Daesh and located 40 kilometers from the borders] and the Iraqi side was charging the trucks $400 each.”
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also confirmed Thursday that the Syrian regime had lost control of its last border crossing with Iraq.
“The regime forces have lost the last border crossing with Iraq, where IS [Daesh] seizes the al-Bokamal crossing in the countryside of Deir Ezzor that links the Syrian city of al- Bokamal with the Iraqi city of al- Qaem, while YPG [Syrian Kurdish forces] seizes the al-Ya’robiyyi crossing in al-Hasakah that links the Syrian town of al-Ya’robiyyi with the Iraqi town of Rabi’ah,” the observatory said.
The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights is an anti-Bashar al-Assad body which describes itself as not being associated or linked with any political body. It was founded in May 2006. The information and figures provided by the observatory could not be independently verified.
