AFP, Arbil :
Flights to and from two northern Iraqi airports were suspended for 48 hours for the second time in roughly two weeks due to Russian strikes in Syria, officials said today.
The directors of the Arbil and Sulaimaniyah airports in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region both said that flights had been suspended due to danger posed by Russian cruise missiles heading to Syria.
Flights to the two airports were also suspended for 48 hours beginning on November 23 for the same reason.
And flights in and out of Lebanon were rerouted and some airlines cancelled services after Moscow requested they avoid an area over the eastern Mediterranean a few days before that. Russia began carrying out strikes in Syria on September 30 in support of its longstanding ally President Bashar al-Assad.
In its bombing campaign, Moscow has fired cruise missiles from warships in the Caspian Sea that passed over northern Iraq en route to their targets in Syria.
A US-led coalition is also carrying out strikes against the ISIS in Iraq and Syria, where the jihadists have declared a cross-border “caliphate” spanning territory it controls in the two countries.
A frame grab taken from footage released by Russia’s Defence Ministry October 9, 2015, shows a Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber dropping a bomb in the air over Syria.
Meanwhile, at least 32 fighters of the militant Islamic State group were killed on Sunday in apparent US-led coalition raids on Syria as President Bashar al-Assad slammed Britain’s decision to participate in air strikes.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said at least 32 fighters had been killed in some 15 strikes on the group’s stronghold of Raqa province in northern Syria.
The monitor’s head, Rami Abdel Rahman, said at least 40 jihadists were also wounded in the strikes, which hit IS headquarters and bases to the north, east and southeast of provincial capital Raqa city.
The city is the de facto Syrian capital of the group, which calls the large stretches of territory it controls in Syria and neighbouring Iraq an Islamic “caliphate”.
Abdel Rahman said the casualty figures were collected from a single hospital and the final toll from the air strikes could rise.
Raqa is frequently the target of air strikes by the US-led coalition, as well as the Syrian air force, and Russian warplanes that began an air campaign in Syria in late September.
The US-led coalition has been targeting IS in Syria since last September, expanding a campaign that began with raids in neighbouring Iraq.
Flights to and from two northern Iraqi airports were suspended for 48 hours for the second time in roughly two weeks due to Russian strikes in Syria, officials said today.
The directors of the Arbil and Sulaimaniyah airports in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region both said that flights had been suspended due to danger posed by Russian cruise missiles heading to Syria.
Flights to the two airports were also suspended for 48 hours beginning on November 23 for the same reason.
And flights in and out of Lebanon were rerouted and some airlines cancelled services after Moscow requested they avoid an area over the eastern Mediterranean a few days before that. Russia began carrying out strikes in Syria on September 30 in support of its longstanding ally President Bashar al-Assad.
In its bombing campaign, Moscow has fired cruise missiles from warships in the Caspian Sea that passed over northern Iraq en route to their targets in Syria.
A US-led coalition is also carrying out strikes against the ISIS in Iraq and Syria, where the jihadists have declared a cross-border “caliphate” spanning territory it controls in the two countries.
A frame grab taken from footage released by Russia’s Defence Ministry October 9, 2015, shows a Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber dropping a bomb in the air over Syria.
Meanwhile, at least 32 fighters of the militant Islamic State group were killed on Sunday in apparent US-led coalition raids on Syria as President Bashar al-Assad slammed Britain’s decision to participate in air strikes.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said at least 32 fighters had been killed in some 15 strikes on the group’s stronghold of Raqa province in northern Syria.
The monitor’s head, Rami Abdel Rahman, said at least 40 jihadists were also wounded in the strikes, which hit IS headquarters and bases to the north, east and southeast of provincial capital Raqa city.
The city is the de facto Syrian capital of the group, which calls the large stretches of territory it controls in Syria and neighbouring Iraq an Islamic “caliphate”.
Abdel Rahman said the casualty figures were collected from a single hospital and the final toll from the air strikes could rise.
Raqa is frequently the target of air strikes by the US-led coalition, as well as the Syrian air force, and Russian warplanes that began an air campaign in Syria in late September.
The US-led coalition has been targeting IS in Syria since last September, expanding a campaign that began with raids in neighbouring Iraq.
