Beirut: Syrian government troops and militia clashed on Sunday with Daesh terrorists near one of the jewels of the country’s heritage, ancient Palmyra.
At least 23 regime loyalists and 29 Daesh terrorists were killed as Daesh overran northern neighbourhoods of the adjacent modern town of Tadmur late on Saturday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The Britain-based watchdog reported heavy artillery exchanges in the west of the town, close to the UNESCO-listed world heritage site.
But Syrian antiquities chief Mamoun Abdul Karim said clashes had subsided by mid-morning as troops pushed Daesh out of the northern part of the adjacent modern town of Tadmur.
“We have good news today, we feel much better,” he told AFP by phone, saying he was in contact with staff in Palmyra every half an hour.
“There was no damage to the ruins, but this does not mean we should not be afraid,” Abdul Karim added.
Daesh had brought up reinforcements from its stronghold in the Euphrates Valley to the east after sustaining heavy losses in its advance on the oasis town northeast of Damascus, provincial governor Talal Barazi told AFP.
The town’s peacetime population of 70,000 has been swamped by an influx of civilians fleeing the Daesh advance.
“We are taking all necessary precautions, and we are working on securing humanitarian aid quickly in fear of mass fleeing from the city,” Barazi said.
Abdul Karim voiced extreme concern for the ancient site and its adjacent museum, in light of the destruction wreaked by Daesh on pre-Islamic sites like Nimrud and Hatra in neighbouring Iraq.
The antiquities chief said he had been “living in a state of terror” that Daesh would destroy Palmyra’s well-preserved architecture, regarded as one of the jewels of the ancient Middle East.
