Troops loyal to the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, backed by intense Russian airstrikes, have retaken strategic territory near the government’s stronghold of Latakia, scoring a key victory before possible peace talks in Geneva.
The conquest of the towns in northern Latakia, near the Turkish border, was seen by some observers as a message from Russia, which has intervened to prop up Assad, to the government in Ankara that has supported the rebel cause – especially the ethnic Syrian Turkmen in the area – and shot down a Russian fighter jet in the vicinity. “The Russian airstrikes for more than a month had intensified to a horrific extent and they were bombing all the frontlines that we are on,” said Nasser al-Turkmani, a spokesperson for the opposition’s Turkmen-Syrian Council. “We had to withdraw from the area because it would have been suicide to stay. The destruction cannot be described, even the trees have been burned as a result of this scorched earth policy.”
Forces loyal to the Syrian government, which rebel sources say primarily comprised troops from the Lebanese Hezbollah movement, the Iraqi militia Kataeb Hezbollah, Iranian Revolutionary Guards and pro-government militia recruits, established control over the town of Rabia in northern Latakia.
Their victory came weeks after they seized Salma, another rebel enclave in the area. Latakia is a stronghold of the Assad regime and the Alawite sect, to which the president belongs, but the opposition had long established a foothold in the northern reaches of the area across the border from Turkey.
Peace talks are scheduled in Geneva in an attempt to negotiate an end to the five-year civil war. The opposition has complained about what it says is undue pressure from the US to attend the talks without preconditions demanding an end to shelling and sieges on civilians living in opposition-held territories. The talks were due to start on Monday but have been delayed.
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