Syrian soldiers fought their way into an air base in northern Syria on Tuesday (November 10) and freed military personnel inside, state television said, after a nearly two-year siege by Islamic State insurgents at the facility.
A military source close to the government said the army was working to secure the Kweires air base in Aleppo Province, where soldiers and officers have been under attack since 2013.
It is the most high-profile victory for Syria’s army since Russia launched an air campaign in support of President Bashar al-Assad on Sept. 30.
Syrian state media said that Assad congratulated the head of the military air base for the steadfastness of the troops and also the commander of the offensive which broke the siege.
“I salute the heroes who remained steadfast for years, and I salute the heroes who contributed to ending the siege, and I salute every soldier in the Syrian Arab army, for he is a brother, or son to us, and their life and safety is always the first of priorities. May there be mercy to all the martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the sake of saving their comrades, families and their country across all the nation’s land,” he was quoted as saying.
The military source said hundreds of soldiers were freed.
The commander of Kweires airbase Major-General Munthir Zammam, said his men managed to pull through these years through strong willpower.
“Since the start of the siege, we got the willpower to be steadfast, the willpower to fight, the willpower to have strength. We had confidence in the leader (Assad) and our armed forces. We had this willpower through trust and love, we were always trusted by the leader and our armed forces. We were always loyal to the pledge that we undertook to defend this base until the last drop of these heroes who are within this facility,” he said.
Britain-based monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also said that an advance party of troops had reached the air base and “broken the siege.”
Syrian troops have also been supported by Iranian forces and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters in a push to regain territory, largely in the north, lost to insurgents during almost five years of conflict.
Rebels have frustrated a campaign to reclaim territory elsewhere in the country, where Russian jets have flown more than 1,600 sorties in little over a month.
The breaking of the Kweires siege stood in stark contrast to Islamic State’s capture of Tabqa air base in Raqqa province in the north of the country last year, when militants killed scores of soldiers.
The families of soldiers under siege in Kweires had staged protests urging the government to do more to take it back. (Reuters)