At least fourteen people were killed yesterday Sunday while collecting truffles due to the explosion of a mine planted by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group in a desert area in northern Syria, the official Syrian news agency SANA reported.
“Fourteen civilians were killed and eight others were injured in the explosion of an anti-personnel mine planted by IS terrorists while they were picking truffles in the desert in Raqqa province”the former “capital” of the “caliphate” of the jihadists, the agency clarified.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a non-governmental organization based in Britain, which has a wide network of sources in Syria, had earlier said that 13 civilians, “including women”, had been killed in the blast.
The jihadist organization, which had brought large parts of Syria under its control since 2014, was defeated in March 2019 in that country under attacks from multiple directions, both by government forces with the support of its allies, and by US-led international coalition spearheaded by Kurdish fighters. But numerous jihadists have retreated into the Syrian desert, while countless landmines have been planted in the area.
Hundreds of dead
The Syrian desert has a reputation for producing some of the world’s best truffles, prices of which have skyrocketed amid the nearly decade-and-a-half war and a crushing economic crisis — making harvesting them all the more financially attractive.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, members of the jihadist group often target residents looking for truffles in remote areas. Despite frequent warnings from the authorities, this high-risk activity continues.
In 2023, hundreds of people, the vast majority of them civilians, were killed while collecting truffles, the price of which remains high, in attacks by IS jihadists in the desert or due to mine explosions, according to the same NGO.
Syria’s highly complex war, which erupted in 2011, triggered by a bloody crackdown on protests centered on the country’s democratization, has killed more than half a million people, turned millions more into internally displaced persons or refugees, and fragmented its territory. .
SOURCE: APE-ME
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