Russian special forces helping Syrian troops in key city
MOSCOW (AP) - Russian special forces are helping Syrian government troops fight Islamic State militants in the battle underway for the strategic city of Deir el-Zour in eastern Syria, the defense ministry in Moscow said on Thursday.
The deployment comes amid rising concerns of a direct confrontation on the ground between Russian-backed forces on one side and the U.S.-supported Kurdish-led Syrian forces on the other.
Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, the Russian ministry's spokesman, said U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces shelled Syrian government positions outside Deir el-Zour twice in recent days. He warned the U.S.-led coalition that Moscow would have to retaliate if the Russian troops in the area were to come under fire.
The U.S.-led forces have already accused Russia of targeting its troops in Deir el-Zour in an airstrike, a claim Moscow denied.
Russia began its operation to support President Bashar Assad's offensive against the IS in Syria in 2015 but has mostly focused on providing air cover to government troops on the ground.
The campaign for Deir el-Zour, Syria's largest eastern city, is caught up in a race between government troops and the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.
In the past two weeks, the pro-government forces, backed by Russian air cover and Iranian-allied militiamen, gained control of most of the city and crossed the Euphrates River to the area of SDF operations. Despite U.S. comments that consultations between the two sides intensified to avoid confrontation on the ground, the trading of accusations has continued.
Last week, the Kurdish-led and U.S.-supported SDF said its fighters were hit in the airstrike in an industrial area on the eastern side of the river, which they had liberated from IS militants. Russia denied the accusations.
Thursday's statement from Konashenkov said Russian special forces have been deployed to help Syrian government forces fighting the IS militants outside Deir el-Zour.
There was no immediate comment from the SDF or the coalition.
The Russian-backed offensive on Deir el-Zour began on Sept. 5, when the Syrian forces breached a nearly 3-year old siege on its troops north of the city. Syrian troops now control roughly 85 percent of the city and expect to gain full control of it in the coming week, Konashenkov said.
A Syrian government offensive late on Wednesday captured two villages on the Euphrates' western bank, liberating about 16 square kilometers (6 square miles) of land, Konashenkov also said.
The development comes as the battle for the IS stronghold of Raqqa, north of Deir el-Zour, is reaching its "final stages", the SDF said Wednesday, nearly four months after the offensive began.
The Kurdish-led SDF said it captured Raqqa's last grain silos from the militants in a surprise offensive on the city's northern neighborhoods. Less than 300 militants remain holed up in the city, which has witnessed an intense bombing campaign, particularly in the last few days, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights that monitors the war.
The campaign to take Raqqa began in June in a quick advance after a breach of the wall of the Old City, a major fortification for the militants. But it has since slowed down as the forces faced mounting resistance from the militants.
The Russian defense ministry, however, claimed on Thursday that its intelligence shows the coalition's operation in Raqqa had stopped, and that SDF fighters have been redeployed from there to Deir el-Zour.
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Associated Press Writer Sarah El Deeb in Beirut contributed to this report.