commander

Interior Ministry says the raid killed Mohammed Shahadeh, describing him as one of ISIL’s senior commanders in Syria.

Syrian authorities say security forces have carried out a second operation against ISIL (ISIS) fighters near Damascus, killing a senior figure described as the group’s governor of Hauran.

In a statement on Thursday, the Ministry of Interior said the raid killed Mohammed Shahadeh, also known as Abu Omar Shaddad, calling him one of ISIL’s senior commanders in Syria and a direct threat to local security.

Officials said the operation followed verified intelligence and extensive surveillance and was carried out by specialised units, operating in the Damascus countryside, that conducted a targeted raid in the town of al-Buweida, near Qatana, southwest of the capital.

The operation also involved the General Intelligence Directorate and took place in coordination with international coalition forces, the ministry said.

‘Crippling blow’

The announcement came a day after Syrian internal security forces arrested another senior ISIL figure in a separate operation near Damascus, according to the state-run SANA news agency.

SANA reported that forces arrested Taha al-Zoubi during what it described as a “tightly executed security operation” in the Damascus countryside. The agency said officers seized “a suicide belt and a military weapon” during the arrest.

Brigadier General Ahmad al-Dalati, head of internal security in the Damascus countryside, told SANA that the raid targeted an ISIL hideout in Maadamiya, southwest of the capital.

ISIL, which considers the current authorities in Damascus illegitimate, has largely focused its remaining operations on Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria.

At the height of its power, the armed group controlled vast areas of Iraq and Syria, declaring Raqqa its capital.

Although ISIL suffered military defeat in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria two years later, its cells continue to carry out attacks in the region and beyond, including in parts of Africa and Afghanistan.

The commander of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) said Friday that the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) should not be “politicized,” voicing opposition to a bill in South Korea that seeks to grant the government control of non-military access to the buffer zone.

The remarks by USFK Commander Gen. Xavier Brunson, who also doubles as commander of the U.N. Command (UNC), followed a recent UNC statement in opposition to the pending bill.

He said the armistice agreement that ended the 1950-53 Korean War should remain the barometer governing behavior. Under the armistice, the UNC currently has the authority to approve or deny access to the DMZ.

“What we want to try to make sure that we do is, number one, we don’t allow that area to become politicized … we signed an agreement to say that we will maintain this buffer here,” Brunson said in an episode of security-focused podcast series “War on the Rocks.”

Brunson noted that South Korea recently proposed military talks with North Korea to discuss how to clarify the Military Demarcation Line in the DMZ in a bid to prevent possible clashes near the inter-Korean border, but emphasized that all actions should be based on the armistice agreement.

“What governs our behavior is the armistice, and we’ve got to adhere to the standards put forward in the armistice. And as long as we do that, there won’t be any challenges,” he said. “What we can’t do is seek to change the way we do business in abrogation of a legal document, which is the armistice.”

The USFK commander’s call urging the need to adhere to the armistice came just days after the UNC issued a rare statement underscoring its role as the “administrator” of the DMZ, which stretches about 250 kilometers in length and 4 km in width, and has served as a buffer between the two Koreas since the end of the Korean War.

Speaking on Seoul’s plan to seek a conditions-based handover of wartime operational control from Washington within President Lee Jae Myung’s five-year term ending in 2030, Brunson said the United States has no intention to “hold this up at all.”

He still emphasized that the bilaterally agreed-upon conditions should be met for the transfer.

“We’ve got to make sure that we’ve met all those conditions whether they be operational, whether they be material based, whether it might be something as simple as protection that those things are all in place before we go and do this,” he said.

Against such a backdrop, Brunson touted how South Korea’s “thriving” defense industry and participation in multinational drills like Talisman Sabre, held in Australia, have strengthened its capabilities as well as role in the wider Indo-Pacific region and called on the country to further “pull away from the Peninsula and become more engaged.”

“I’ve talked a lot about the centrality and importance of the Republic of Korea to the entirety of the Indo-Pacific by virtue of their economy, by virtue of the size of their military, by virtue of their ability to continue to develop technologies,” he said, referring to South Korea by its formal name.

“They are just preeminently important to peace in the Indo-Pacific.”

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