Five explosions hit government-controlled areas and a city held by a Kurdish militia in Syria on Monday morning, killing several people, state media and a monitor said. On Sunday, Turkish troops and allied Syrian rebels pushed the extremist group back from the last stretch of the Syrian-Turkish border under its control, closing off a vital link with the outside world. Their foregn ministers, Secretary of State John Kerry and Sergey Lavrov, had met ealier in efforts to negotiate a plan for cooperation between the two major military powers now involved in the conflict.
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A news agency affiliated to the jihadist group Islamic State (IS) said it was behind the Hassakeh attack, which allegedly targeted Kurdish militiamen. The first was a vehicle bomb, the second a suicide belt detonated against the first responders.
The projectiles also caused substantial damage to public properties and several houses in the targeted area. “Even before the revolution it was carefully guarded”, said opposition media activist Yousef al-Boustani, referring to the 2011 uprising against President Bashar Assad, which began with peaceful protests.
Attackers detonated two bombs at the entrance of the government stronghold of Tartus along the worldwide coastal highway, SANA said, killing 30. The bombing caused the brief closure of the Tartus-Homs highway, according to state TV.
At least 43 people died in the blasts, and 45 were also wounded in the double bombing outside of Tartus city, which is home to a Russian naval base.
In this northeastern city 80km (49 miles) from the Turkish border and controlled mainly by Kurdish forces, six members of the Kurds’ Asayesh security forces and two civilians were killed by a bomber on a motorcycle who blew up an Kurdish checkpoint.
The Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said the dead in both the Homs and Al-Sabura road attacks were government security forces manning checkpoints.
While no individual group has claimed responsibility for the attack, targeting civilians with secondary suicide bombers to cause maximum casualties is a tactic often employed by the Islamic State (Isis) militant group. The bomb blast occurred in the government controlled district. The meeting went ahead with no agreement in sight, although the two sides said they would continue to talk.
Dozens killed by blasts in govt, Kurdish areas * Obama, Putin discuss Syria at G20, but no deal * Turkey sweeps Islamic State out of border stretch By Lisa Barrington and Roberta Rampton BEIRUT/HANGZHOU, China, Sept 5 (Reuters) – Explosions in government-controlled areas of Syria and a province held by Kurdish militia killed dozens on Monday, while the United States and Russian Federation failed to make concrete progress towards a ceasefire.
IS claimed the attack in a statement circulated on social media.
Government forces withdrew from Hasakeh in August after street battles with Kurdish forces, which took control of the city, though the state’s police force remained in place.
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The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said three Kurdish Syrian police officers were killed in the blast.
