Kurdish fighters on Monday captured the central prison in Hasakeh after fierce clashes with Syrian regime forces and are in control of 90 percent of the northern city, a monitor said. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said fighting escalated after heavy overnight clashes that saw the Kurds make advances mostly in the south of the flashpoint city.
Hasakeh, capital of the north-eastern province of the same name, is already mostly controlled by Kurdish forces although the majority of its residents are Arabs. Regime and Kurdish forces share a common enemy in the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group, but tensions have been growing between the two sides in Hasakeh leading to the latest clashes.
After hours of calm late Sunday, clashes broke out after midnight in the southern district of Ghweiran and around the buildings of Al-Masaken, which the Kurds later captured, said the monitor. They also routed regime forces from the eastern part of Ghweiran, the largest neighbourhood in Hasakeh, and overran the An-Nashwa area in the south of the city.
The Kurdish forces also seized control of the central prison located in Ghweiran, said the Observatory. "The Kurds now control 90 percent of the city," said the Britain-based monitor, which relies on a network of sources on the ground. A Kurdish official in the city had earlier said that Kurdish police known as the Asayesh were in control of 85 percent of Hasakeh.
"The areas that have been captured will not be returned to the regime. They will remain under Asayesh control," Meskin Ahmed said in an online conference call with reporters. The Observatory said the fighting came as Russian officials pressed mediation efforts amid conflicting reports on whether a truce had been agreed.