Syria: Kurdish Forces Win Back Strategic Int’l Highway in North

The Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria won back control of a strategic international highway in the Northern parts of the country from the Takfiri terrorists on Sunday.

The Kurdish forces seized back Tal Abyad-Aleppo International Highway from the ISIL today.

The YPG fighters approached and surrounded the town of Tal Abyad in Reqqa province from both the Western and Eastern directions on Saturday.

Tal Abyad is a strategically important town due to its closeness to the Turkish borders.

Earlier today, A YPG statement said that its fighters have encircled the ISIL-held town of Suluk, a few kilometers to Southwest of Tal Abyad.

It said that the ISIL terrorists have lost control over Suluk and Kurdish forces were advancing toward Tal Abyad.

It also said the road linking Tal Abyad with Reqqa was under YPG control. The report could not be immediately confirmed. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the Kurds were less than 10 kilometers (six miles) away from Tal Abyad.

The loss of Tal Abyad would be a major blow to the ISIL group.

The border town is a major avenue for commerce for the extremist group — through which it smuggles in foreign fighters and sells black-market oil. The city is also a key link between Turkey and the Northern Syrian city of Reqqa, the de-facto capital of the ISIL group’s self-declared caliphate.

The YPG has made a determined push into Reqqa province from neighboring Hasaka where it has driven ISIL from wide areas of territory since early May.

The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based organization, said the YPG fighters were now half-way between Suluk and Tal Abyad.

The YPG fended off an ISIL attack on the border town of Kobani, or Ayn al-Arab, in January.

For the YPG, dislodging ISIL from Tal Abyad would help them to link up Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria in Hasaka province and Kobani.