Rescuers use a stretcher to evacuate a victim from the rubble of a factory building in Wenling city in eastern China’s Zhejiang province.
(AP)
Beirut — US-led coalition aircraft unleashed a series of air strikes targeting the Islamic State group’s stronghold of Raqqa in eastern Syria, killing at least 10 militants and wounding many others in one of the largest coalition operations carried out in Syria to date, the coalition said Sunday.
At least 16 air strikes were reported late Saturday and early Sunday, triggering successive explosions that shook the city and created panic among residents, activists said. The US-led coalition often targets IS-held towns and cities in Syria, but the overnight strikes on Raqqa were rare in their intensity.
In a statement issued early Sunday, the coalition said it had conducted 16 air strikes throughout Raqqa, destroying vital IS-controlled structures and transit routes in Syria.
“The significant air strikes tonight were executed to deny Daesh the ability to move military capabilities throughout Syria and into Iraq,” said coalition spokesman Lt. Col. Thomas Gilleran, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group.
“This was one of the largest deliberate engagements we have conducted to date in Syria, and it will have debilitating effects on Daesh’s ability to move” from Raqqa.
Raqqa is the de facto capital of the so-called Islamic caliphate declared a year ago by the Islamic State group in territories it controls in Iraq and Syria.
An IS-affiliated militant website confirmed the strikes on the center of the city, saying 10 people were killed and dozens wounded.
It also published purported photos of dead victims, including two of young boys suggesting they were civilians.
A Raqqa-based anti-IS activist network reported eight civilians were killed by the coalition air strikes, including a 10-year-old child.
The report could not be independently confirmed.
The network, called Raqqa is Being Silently Slaughtered, said at least one air strike targeted a group of IS members in the city center.
Another targeted an IS checkpoint while a third destroyed large parts of an IS-held brick factory in the city.
In the remote northeastern city of Hassakeh, IS suicide bombers detonated an explosives-laden truck near a main power plant Sunday.
State-run news agency SANA reported casualties and material damage in the power plant on the southern edge of the city.
Fighting has raged in Hassakeh since the IS group attacked several southern neighborhoods held by government troops earlier this month.
The violence has forced tens of thousands of residents to flee.
The predominantly Kurdish city was split between government forces and Kurdish fighters, who have been fighting the IS group separately.
The coalition regularly targets the Islamic State group, which controls about a third of Iraq and Syria.