Tag Archives: Middle East

White House says it retains right to self-defense in Syria; Moscow warns Washington

A U.S. Navy F/A-18E Super Hornet launches from the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) in the Mediterranean Sea June 28, 2016. U.S. Navy/Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Ryan U. Kledzik/Handout via Reuters

By Steve Holland, Phil Stewart and Andrew Osborn

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW (Reuters) – The White House said on Monday that coalition forces fighting Islamic State militants in Syria retained the right to self-defense as Russia warned it viewed any planes flying in its area of operations as potential targets.

Tensions escalated on Sunday as the U.S. military brought down a Syrian military jet near Raqqa for bombing near U.S.-allied forces on the ground, the first time Washington had carried out such an action in the multi-pronged civil war.

It was also the first time the U.S. Air Force had shot down a manned aircraft since May 1999.

In a move that will fan tensions between Washington and Moscow, Russia made clear it was changing its military posture in response to the U.S. downing of the jet.

Russia, a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said it would treat U.S.-led coalition aircraft flying west of the Euphrates River in Syria as potential targets and track them with missile systems and military aircraft. It stopped short of saying it would shoot them down.

The Russian Defence Ministry said it was also immediately scrapping a Syrian air safety agreement with Washington designed to avoid collisions and dangerous incidents.

Moscow accused Washington of failing to honor the pact by not informing it of the decision to shoot down the Syrian plane despite Russian aircraft being airborne at the same time.

Washington hit back, saying it would “do what we can to protect our interests.”

“The escalation of hostilities among the many factions that are operating in this region doesn’t help anybody. And the Syrian regime and others in the regime need to understand that we will retain the right of self-defense, of coalition forces aligned against ISIS,” White House spokesman Sean Spicer said.

The U.S. military said it was repositioning its aircraft over Syria to ensure the safety of American air crews targeting Islamic State.

The White House also said it would work to keep lines of communication open with Russia amid the new tensions. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said the United States was working to restore a “deconfliction” communications line with Russia meant to avoid an accidental clash over Syria.

Marine General Joseph Dunford said there were still communications between a U.S. air operations center in Qatar and Russian forces on the ground in Syria, adding: “We’ll work diplomatically and military in the coming hours to re-establish deconfliction.”

The U.S. Central Command had issued a statement saying the downed Syrian military jet had been dropping bombs near U.S.-backed SDF forces, which are seeking to oust Islamic State from the city of Raqqa.

It said the shooting down of the plane was “collective self-defense” and the coalition had contacted Russian counterparts by telephone via an established “de-confliction line to de-escalate the situation and stop the firing.

Russia is supporting Assad militarily with air power, advisers and special forces as he tries to roll back Islamic State and other militant groups. Unlike the United States, it says its presence is sanctioned by the Syrian government.

Adding to the tension, Iran launched missiles at Islamic State targets in eastern Syria on Sunday, a strike seen as a projection of military power into part of Syria identified as a top priority by Damascus and its allies.

(Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Peter Cooney)

U.S. Senate’s Iran sanctions are breach of nuclear deal: senior Iranian official

FILE PHOTO: Iran's national flags are seen on a square in Tehran February 10, 2012, a day before the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. REUTERS/Morteza Nikoubazl/File Photo

ANKARA (Reuters) – The U.S. Senate’s decision to impose new sanctions on Iran is an “unquestionable” violation of a nuclear deal reached in 2015 between Tehran and six major powers including the United States, Iranian media quoted a senior Iranian official as saying.

The Senate approved on Thursday the sanctions on Iran over its ballistic missile program and other activities not related to the international nuclear agreement.

“The U.S. Senate’s move is unquestionably in breach of both the spirit and the letter of the nuclear deal,” Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was reported by media as saying on Friday.

“The Iranian committee tasked with monitoring the accord will certainly examine the congressional move and come up with a decent response.”

The U.S. legislation still must pass the House of Representatives and be signed by President Donald Trump to become law.

Trump has in the past called the nuclear agreement between Tehran and the major powers “the worst deal ever negotiated”. Under the deal, Iran agreed to curb its nuclear program in return for the lifting of nuclear-related sanctions.

The United States and its regional ally Saudi Arabia accuse Iran of subverting regional security. Iran also accuses its arch foes, Washington and Riyadh, for promoting Islamist militancy in the region.

“America is trying to cover up the repeated defeats it has suffered from Iran in Iraq and Syria,” Velayati said.

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Gareth Jones and Pritha Sarkar)

100,000 civilians behind Islamic State lines in Iraqi city of Mosul

Displaced civilians walk towards the Iraqi Army positions after fleeing their homes due to clashes in the Shifa neighbourhood in western Mosul, Iraq June 15 2017. REUTERS/Erik De Castro

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – About 100,000 civilians remain trapped behind Islamic State lines in Mosul with a U.S.-backed government offensive to recapture the Iraqi city entering its ninth month, the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR said on Friday.

Islamic State snipers are shooting at families trying to flee on foot or by boat across the Tigris River, it said.

“These civilians are basically held as human shields in the Old City,” said the UNHCR representative in Iraq, Bruno Geddo, referring to Mosul’s historic district where the militants are besieged by Iraqi government forces.

“There is hardly any food, water, electricity, fuel. These civilians are living in an increasingly worsening situation of penury and panic because they are surrounded by fighting.”

The offensive to retake Mosul, Islamic State’s de facto capital in Iraq, started on Oct. 17 with air and ground support from a U.S.-led international coalition.

Iraqi government forces regained eastern Mosul in January, then a month later began the offensive on the western side that includes the Old City.

The Old City “is a very dense labyrinth, a maze of narrow alleyways where fighting will have to be done on foot, house by house,” said Geddo.

“ISIS (Islamic State) snipers continue to aim at people trying to flee because there is this long-standing policy of executing people trying to flee the territory of the caliphate,” he said.

The fall of Mosul would, in effect, mark the end of the Iraqi half of the “caliphate” that Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared in a speech from an historic mosque in the Old City three years ago, covering parts of Iraq and Syria.

Moscow said on Friday its forces may have killed Baghdadi in an air strike in Syria last month, but Washington said it could not corroborate the death and Western and Iraqi officials were skeptical.

About 200,000 people were estimated to be trapped behind Islamic State lines in Mosul in May, but the number has declined as government forces have thrust further into the city.

About 800,000 people, more than a third of the pre-war population of the northern Iraqi city, have fled, seeking refuge with friends and relatives or in camps. UNHCR has provided many with shelter, food and other necessities.

Geddo voiced deep concern about “collective punishment” of families whose relative may have been an IS fighter.

“Collective punishment means in a deeply tribal society that you see evictions, destruction of property, confiscation of property for families perceived as being associated with ISIS because one family member might have been having that link.

“This is a very critical point for the future of Iraq. Because it is essential to uphold the rule of law, to pursue those who committed crimes through the court system, the judicial system, rather than applying tribal custom,” he said.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay, writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Iraqi forces say about to encircle Islamic State in Mosul’s Old City

A boy carries a baby as they flee their home. REUTERS/Erik De Castro

ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) – Iraqi forces said they were about to complete the encirclement of Islamic State’s stronghold in the Old City of Mosul, after taking control of a neighboring district on Thursday.

Iraq’s military said it had captured Bab Sinjar, north of the historic, densely-populated district where the militants launched their cross-border “caliphate” in 2014.

Government forces and their allies still have to take full control of Medical City, a complex of hospitals further north along the bank of the Tigris, to enclose the militant enclave.

The offensive to retake the northern city started in October with air and ground support from a U.S.-led international coalition.

Iraqi government forces retook eastern Mosul in January then a month later began the offensive on the western side where bout 200,000 civilians remain trapped behind Islamic State lines.

The fall of Mosul would, in effect, mark the end of the Iraqi half of the “caliphate” that Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared in a speech from a historic mosque in the Old City.

About 800,000 people, more than a third of the pre-war population of Mosul, have already fled, seeking refuge with friends and relatives or in camps.

Kurdish forces backed by U.S.-air strikes are also besieging Islamic State forces in the city of Raqqa, the militants’ de facto capital in neighboring Syria.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

Russia’s military says may have killed IS leader Baghdadi

By Dmitry Solovyov

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Friday it was checking information that a Russian air strike near the Syrian city of Raqqa may have killed Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in late May.

The air strike was launched after the Russian forces in Syria received intelligence that a meeting of Islamic State leaders was being planned, the ministry said in a statement posted on its Facebook page.

“On May 28, after drones were used to confirm the information on the place and time of the meeting of IS leaders, between 00:35 and 00:45, Russian air forces launched a strike on the command point where the leaders were located,” the statement said.

“According to the information which is now being checked via various channels, also present at the meeting was Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was eliminated as a result of the strike,” the ministry said.

The U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State said it could not confirm the Russian report that Baghdadi may have been killed.

The strike is believed to have killed several other senior leaders of the group, as well as around 30 field commanders and up to 300 of their personal guards, the Russian defense ministry statement said.

The IS leaders had gathered at the command center, in a southern suburb of Raqqa, to discuss possible routes for the militants’ retreat from the city, the statement said.

The United States was informed in advance about the place and time of the strike, the Russian military said.

Islamic State fighters are close to defeat in the twin capitals of the group’s territory, Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria.

Russian forces support the Syrian government which is fighting against Islamic State mainly from the west, while a U.S.-led coalition supports Iraqi government forces fighting against Islamic State from the east.

The last public video footage of Baghdadi shows him dressed in black clerical robes declaring his caliphate from the pulpit of Mosul’s medieval Grand al-Nuri mosque back in 2014.

Born Ibrahim al-Samarrai, Baghdadi is a 46-year-old Iraqi who broke away from al Qaeda in 2013, two years after the capture and killing of the group’s leader Osama bin Laden.

Rami Abdulrahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, cast doubt on the report Baghdadi may have been killed. He said that according to his information, Baghdadi was located in another part of Syria at the end of May.

“The information is that as of the end of last month Baghdadi was in Deir al-Zor, in the area between Deir al-Zor and Iraq, in Syrian territory,” he said by phone.

Questioning what Baghdadi would have been doing in that location, he said: “Is it reasonable that Baghdadi would put himself between a rock and a hard place of the (U.S.-led) coalition and Russia?”

(Additional reporting by Polina Devitt in MOSCOW and Tom Perry in BEIRUT; Writing by Dmitry Solovyov and Christian Lowe; Editing by)

Trump set for first U.S. Supreme Court visit as justices weigh travel ban

FILE PHOTO: The Supreme Court is seen ahead of the Senate voting to confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch as an Associate Justice in Washington, DC, U.S. on April 7, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein/File Photo

By Lawrence Hurley

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – For the first time since he was elected, President Donald Trump is set to attend the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday, presenting a potentially awkward moment as the court weighs what to do about his contentious executive order that attempts to restrict U.S. entry by people from six Muslim-majority countries.

Trump is scheduled to visit the ornate, marble-clad courthouse in Washington for the investiture of new Justice Neil Gorsuch, whose Senate confirmation in April was his first major accomplishment.

Attention will be focused on whether Trump, known for his off-the-cuff remarks and incendiary tweets, will follow the rules of an institution known for its courtesy and tradition.

The stakes are heightened by the fact that Trump’s so-called travel ban, one of his signature policies, is now before the justices after being blocked by lower courts.

The president is expected to sit in the courtroom during the brief ceremony in which Chief Justice John Roberts will administer the judicial oath to Gorsuch.

Trump is not expected to make a speech at the event, but he is likely to talk briefly to the justices beforehand in the court’s conference room, as other presidents have done in the past, according to a court spokeswoman.

In deciding whether to allow the travel ban to go into effect, the justices are set to weigh whether Trump’s harsh election campaign rhetoric can be used as evidence that the March 6 order was intended to discriminate against Muslims.

Trump has spoken out against courts blocking the ban and has also criticized his own lawyers. The court is currently considering an emergency request from the administration seeking to put its travel ban into effect while litigation continues.

Federal judges in Maryland and Hawaii blocked Trump’s 90-day ban on travelers from Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The Hawaii judge also blocked a 120-day ban on refugees entering the United States. The injunctions blocking the ban were upheld on appeal.

Trump’s appointment of conservative Gorsuch has been his most significant win since taking office in January.

Gorsuch, who has been sitting on the bench since April 10, restored the high court’s 5-4 conservative majority. There was a vacancy on the court for more than a year following the death of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia.

(Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Lisa Shumaker)

Iraqi forces repel Islamic State counter-attack in west Mosul – police

Civilians are handed out sacs of wheat and sugar in western Mosul, Iraq June 14, 2017. REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraqi forces repelled a major counter-attack by Islamic State fighters at dawn on Wednesday in a district south of the Old City of Mosul, their remaining enclave in the city, a police commander said.

Dozens of IS fighters were killed in the operation to push back the militants, many of whom wore suicide vests, the commander told Reuters.

Residents said the militants seized a number of blocks in the Danadan district of the northern Iraqi city before being driven out in fierce clashes.

“Terrorists came from the Old City and attacked our forces using mortars and sniper shots. They managed to temporarily seize some buildings but we forced them to retreat after shelling their positions,” said a federal police officer.

A Reuters visuals team heading to Mosul from the northern side reported intense artillery fire in the morning.

Another federal police officer said an operation was still underway to chase some Islamic State militants who might still be hiding in some buildings.

In an online statement, Islamic State said it killed 40 of the federal police forces deployed in west Mosul and destroyed eight military vehicles.

Iraqi forces on Tuesday reported progress in the U.S.-backed campaign to dislodge Islamic State from Mosul, announcing the capture of Zanjili, a district just north the city’s historic center.

The Islamic State-held enclave in Mosul has shrunk to two districts along the western banks of the Tigris river – the densely populated Old City center and the Medical City.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

Mosul Old City residents spend hungry and fearful Ramadan under IS rule

Displaced Iraqi family from Mosul eat a simple meal for their Iftar, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan at a refugee camp al-Khazir in the outskirts of Erbil, Iraq June 10, 2017. Picture taken June 10, 2017. REUTERS/Erik De Castro

By Ahmed Rasheed

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – For Salam, a resident in the Islamic State-held Old City of Mosul, the holy fasting month of Ramadan this year is the worst he’s seen in a lifetime marked by wars and deprivations.

“We are slowly dying from hunger, boiling mouldy wheat as soup” to break the fast at sunset, the 47 year-old father of three said by phone from the district besieged by Iraqi forces, asking to withhold his name fearing the militants’ retribution.

The only wish he makes in his prayers is for his family to survive the final days of the self-proclaimed caliphate declared three years ago by IS’s leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi from a nearby mosque.

The eight-month old U.S.-backed campaign to capture Mosul, IS’s de-facto capital in Iraq, reached its deadliest phase just as the holy Muslim month started at the end of May, when militants became squeezed in and around the densely populated Old City.

Up to 200,000 people are trapped behind their lines, half of them children, according to the United Nations.

Hundreds have been killed while trying to escape to government-held lines, caught in the cross-fire or gunned down by Islamic State snipers. The militants want civilians to remain in areas under their control to use them as human shields.

Many bodies of the dead remain in the street near the frontlines. Four of them are relatives of Khalil, a former civil servant who quit his job after IS took over Mosul.

“Daesh warned us not to bury them to make them an example for others who try to flee,” he said, using an acronym for Islamic State.

Those who decide not to run the risk of fleeing are living in fear of getting killed or wounded in their homes, with little food and water and limited access to healthcare.

“Seeing my kids hungry is real torture,” said Salam, who closed his home appliances shop shortly after the start of the offensive as sales came to a complete stop.”I wish the security forces would eliminate all Daesh fighters in a flash; I want my family to have normal life again.”

Where food can be found, the price has risen more than 20-fold. A kilo of rice is selling for more than $40. A kilo of flour or lentils is $20 or more.

The sellers are mainly households who stockpiled enough food and medicine to dare sell some, but only to trusted neighbors or relatives, or in return for items they need. If militants find food they take it.

Residents fill water from a few wells dug in the soil. The wait is long and dangerous as shelling is frequent.

“The well-water has a bitter taste and we can smell sewage sometimes, but we have to drink to stay alive,” said Umm Saad, a widow and mother of four, complaining that the militants are often seen with bottled water and canned food.

“We have been under compulsory fasting even before the start of Ramadan,” she said. “No real food to eat, just hardened old bread and mouldy grains.”

About 800,000 people, more than a third of the pre-war city’s population, have already fled, seeking refuge either with friends and relatives or in camps. But in areas still held by the militants escape has become harder than ever.

“Fleeing is like committing suicide,” said Khalil, the ex-civil servant, who lives near the medieval Grand al-Nuri Mosque, the offensive’s symbolic focus, where Baghdadi proclaimed himself caliph.

IS’s black flag has been flying over its landmark leaning minaret since June 2014, when the Iraqi army fled in the face of the militants, giving them their biggest prize, a city at least four times bigger than any other they came to control in both Iraq and neighboring Syria.

(Reporting by Ahmed Rasheed; editing by Peter Graff)

Revenge for Sinjar: Syrian Kurds free Islamic State slaves

Noura Khodr Khalaf, 24, a Yazidi woman who was recently freed from Islamic State, stands with her children in a centre belonging to the Kurdish-led administration in Qamishli, Syria June 10, 2017. Picture taken June 10, 2017. REUTERS/Rodi Said

By Rodi Said and Ellen Francis

QAMISHLI, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) – Islamic State militants enslaved Noura Khalaf for three years, dragging her from her small Iraqi village across their territory in Syria. They bought and sold her five times before she was finally freed with her children last week.

Khalaf is one of many Yazidi women that Kurdish fighters in northern Syria have set out to free from Islamic State in covert operations, a female Kurdish militia commander told Reuters.

They have dubbed the operation “revenge for the women of Sinjar”, the homeland of Iraq’s ancient Yazidi minority which Islamic State overran in the summer of 2014.

The militants slaughtered, enslaved and raped thousands of people when they rampaged through northern Iraq, purging its Yazidi community. They abducted Yazidi women as sex slaves and gunned down male relatives, witnesses and Iraqi officials say. Nearly 3,000 women are believed to be still in captivity.

Nisreen Abdallah, a commander in the YPJ militia, said around 200 women and children from northern Iraq have been freed in various parts of Syria so far.

The Kurdish YPG militia and its all-female YPJ brigade rescued them in what she described as covert operations into IS territory that began last year. Abdallah declined to divulge more details for security reasons.

The Syrian militias launched this mission as part of their U.S.-backed offensive on Raqqa, Islamic State’s base of operations in Syria, she said.

With the YPG at its forefront, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias began pushing into Raqqa last week, after advancing on the city since November.

“Since then, we have been working to liberate the Yazidi women held captive by Daesh,” Abdallah said. In the case of Khalaf, she said Kurdish fighters made contact with her and drew up “an appropriate plan” to free her unharmed.

CODE WORD

Noura Khalaf said she had been living with her children as the slave of an Islamic State militant in Syria’s Hama province for a year, when an unidentified man smuggled them out in the YPG-coordinated operation.

The plan took shape thanks to IS rules forbidding fighters from taking mobile phones to the frontlines, she said. The jihadist holding Khalaf left his at home, allowing her to call her brother who in turn asked the YPG for help.

“Abu Amir used to leave his phone at home when he went to the frontline,” said 24-year-old Khalaf. “I had memorized my brother’s number.”

Khalaf was eventually told to await contact from a man who would come to rescue her. He uttered a pre-agreed code word, so she would know it was safe to leave with him.

“I’m happy to be staying here,” she said, speaking to Reuters in the Syrian city of Qamishli in the Kurdish-controlled northeast. She will soon return to the Sinjar mountain region. “After I rest here, I will go meet my brother,” she said.

After Islamic State kidnapped Khalaf with her four children in 2014, they bussed her around northern Iraq, including Mosul, along with dozens of women from her hometown of Kojo in Sinjar. “I still don’t know what happened to my husband,” she said.

At one point in her captivity, militants kept her in an underground jail in Raqqa, she said, and at another, they held her in a prison in Palmyra.

“They took us to an underground market for selling women, where they displayed us for Islamic State members and each one picks the girl he likes,” she said. Fighters forced her to serve and cook for them, some beating and raping her repeatedly.

Now, Khalaf and her children are staying at a shelter run by the women’s council of the Kurdish-led administration in northeast Syria.

Abdallah, the YPJ commander, said they deliver the women to their relatives in northern Iraq by coordinating with a Yazidi committee around Sinjar.

Two months earlier, Kurdish fighters also rescued Khalaf’s seven-year-old daughter, who had been sold off near Raqqa, and sent her to relatives in Sinjar, she said.

“We will also send Noura, through the women’s council. So she will see her daughter again,” Abdallah said.

“Those who are freed have been away from their relatives, living among Daesh for years…in alienation and degradation,” Abdallah said. “They have psychological complexes and they need care.”

The beliefs of the Yazidi community, which Islamic State regards as devil-worship, combine elements of several ancient Middle Eastern religions. Mass Yazidi graves have been found since U.S.-backed Iraqi forces seized Sinjar in 2015.

(Reporting by Rodi Said in Syria, Ellen Francis in Beirut; Editing by Tom Perry and Peter Graff)

Iraqi armed forces announce progress in Mosul campaign, say district north of old city captured

Displaced Iraqi residents flee their homes due to fighting between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants, near the Old City in western Mosul, Iraq June 13, 2017. REUTERS/Erik De Castro

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraqi forces on Tuesday reported progress in the U.S.-backed campaign to dislodge Islamic State from Mosul, announcing the capture of a district just north the city’s historic center.

With the loss of the Zanjili neighborhood, the enclave still held by Islamic State in the northern Iraqi city has shrunk to two districts along the western banks of the Tigris river – the densely populated Old City center and the Medical City.

Iraqi government forces retook eastern Mosul in January and began a new push on May 27 to capture the remaining enclave, where up to 200,000 people are trapped.

The Mosul offensive started in October with air and ground support from a U.S.-led international coalition. It has taken much longer than expected as Islamic State is fighting in the middle of civilians, slowing the advance of the assailants.

The fall of Mosul would, in effect, mark the end of the Iraqi half of the “caliphate” declared in 2014 over parts of Iraq and Syria by Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in a speech from a historic mosque in the old city.

In Syria, Kurdish forces backed by U.S.-air strikes are besieging Islamic State forces in the city of Raqqa, the militants’ de facto capital in that country.

About 800,000 people, more than a third of the pre-war population of Mosul, have already fled, seeking refuge either with friends and relatives or in camps.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Hugh Lawson)