State of Alert in Southern Syria After Targeting Russian Faction

Opposition fighters walking in Daraa countryside July 10, 2018. (Reuters)
Opposition fighters walking in Daraa countryside July 10, 2018. (Reuters)
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State of Alert in Southern Syria After Targeting Russian Faction

Opposition fighters walking in Daraa countryside July 10, 2018. (Reuters)
Opposition fighters walking in Daraa countryside July 10, 2018. (Reuters)

The Russian-backed “Fifth Corps” have carried out an inspection campaign after some of the Corps’ members were targeted in Busra.

As crimes and assassinations continue in Southern Syria, Busra – which is the stronghold of the Fifth Corps – witnessed the first assassination attempt of a prominent leader last Saturday, Sep. 18. An explosive device blasted in a neighborhood in Busra, targeting a military vehicle carrying Ali Bash and Qasim al-Miqdad, two leaders of the Fifth Corps group.

Both were wounded and transferred to a hospital in Busra to receive treatment.

Sources close to the matter revealed that the Fifth Corps conducted an inspection campaign hours after the blast, raided several houses in the targeted region, and arrested some of the individuals involved.

Further, a leader from the Fifth Corps was a target of a failed assassination attempt, as someone tryied to shoot him while passing on the road linking Giza and Elemtaih in the east of Daraa.

Adham al-Karad, former leader of an opposition faction in Daraa, threatened earlier to ‘escalate’ in Daraa if the Syrian army refused to withdraw from the zones which its soldiers accessed following the settlement.

Karad also demanded the withdrawal of local groups in Daraa that are working for the security bodies, calling on the negotiating parties and Russia to implement the settlement agreement agreed upon in mid-2018.

The former leader at Al-Bunyan Al-Marsous Operation in Daraa denounced the Syrian regime's recruitment of Daraa tribesmen tand getting them involved in clashes with the city's residents in order to sow discord among tribes.

The Syrian regime provided the local groups with weapons, tanks, and cannons, he added.



Large-scale Refugee Returns Could Overwhelm Syria, UN Migration Agency Chief Warns

Residents stand in line to buy bread from a bakery in Aleppo, Syria. (File/AP)
Residents stand in line to buy bread from a bakery in Aleppo, Syria. (File/AP)
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Large-scale Refugee Returns Could Overwhelm Syria, UN Migration Agency Chief Warns

Residents stand in line to buy bread from a bakery in Aleppo, Syria. (File/AP)
Residents stand in line to buy bread from a bakery in Aleppo, Syria. (File/AP)

Large-scale returns of refugees to Syria could overwhelm the country and even stoke conflict at a fragile moment following the toppling of President Bashar al-Assad earlier this month, the head of the UN migration agency told reporters on Friday.
"We believe that millions of people returning would create conflict within an already fragile society," said Amy Pope, director-general of the International Organization for Migration, told a Geneva press briefing after a trip to the country. "We are not promoting large scale returns. The communities, frankly, are just not ready to absorb the people who are displaced."