Russia bombs 10 IS targets in Syria
Russian planes have flown 20 sorties in Syria and struck 10 Islamic State targets in the past 24 hours, the country's defence ministry said in a statement yesterday.
Russia has said it would step up its air strikes in Syria, escalating a military intervention which Moscow launched on Wednesday to weaken Islamic State militants, but which Western powers say aims to support President Bashar al-Assad.
"As a result of our air strikes on Islamic State targets, we have managed to disrupt their control system, the terrorist organisation's supply lines, and also caused significant damage to the infrastructure used to prepare acts of terror," the ministry said.
British Prime Minister David Cameron said Russia was "backing the butcher Assad, which is a terrible mistake for them and for the world. It is going to make the region more unstable, it will lead to further radicalisation and increase terrorism."
Meanwhile, President Bashar al-Assad said Syria, Russia, Iran and Iraq were united in battling terrorism and were likely to succeed, but warned that the cost of failure would be devastating for the Middle East.
The four nations would achieve "practical results", unlike a US-led international coalition whose year-long campaign of air strikes against Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq had seen an expansion of violence, Assad was quoted yesterday as telling Iranian television in an interview.
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