Syrian troops breach 3-year IS siege on eastern city

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian troops and allied forces reached the eastern city of Deir el-Zour today, breaching a three-year-old Islamic State siege on parts of the contested city near the Iraqi border, the army command and a war monitoring group said.

Lifting the siege on Deir el-Zour, parts of which have been ruled by the extremist group since January 2015, marks another victory for President Bashar Assad, whose forces have been advancing on several fronts against IS and other insurgents over the past year.

It also puts an end to a humanitarian crisis for the estimated 70,000 people who survived on erratic air drops of food and supplies during the 32-month siege. Syrian state media said dozens of trucks carrying aid are ready to move in.

The army command said in a statement that reaching Deir el-Zour marks "a strategic turn in the war against terrorism," and that the city will be used as a "launching pad to expand military operations in the region."

Syrian state TV said troops reached the western outskirts of the city and broke the siege after IS defenses collapsed. Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also reported that troops had breached the siege.

The militants "did give up easily and used lots of suicide car bombs yesterday, but could not resist much," said opposition activist Omar Abu Laila, who currently lives in Europe but is from Deir el-Zour and is in contact with people there.

IS has suffered a series of major setbacks in recent months. Iraqi forces drove the extremists from the northern Iraqi city of Mosul in June, and U.S.-backed Syrian forces have seized more than half of the Syrian city of Raqqa, once the group's self-styled capital.

Syrian troops and allied militiamen, backed by Russia's air force, have for months been advancing toward Deir el-Zour, the provincial capital of the oil-rich province of the same name.