VIDEO: Inside European IS militants' underground hub

Manbij, Syrian Kurdistan (Kurdistan24) – A Kurdistan24 TV crew explored a tunnel in the former Islamic State (IS) stronghold of Manbij where the group’s European members used to operate.

According to locals who IS used in forced labor, the group built the tunnel in over a year and a half.

IS militants were using the tunnel as an underground headquarters to evade the US-led Coalition warplanes, said Kurdish security officials.

The underground hub is about 150 square meters, stretching well over 25 meters in length and two meters in height.

Additionally, the tunnel includes four rooms and an emergency exit.

Kurdish forces liberated Manbij with air support from the US-led anti-IS Coalition in August.

Manbij, a multi-ethnic town in Syria’s Aleppo governorate, had a population of 75,000 people before the civil war.

After its fall to IS in January 2014, the city near the Turkish border became a hub for foreign IS militants who staged multiple attacks in Europe, especially France.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany