Rights watchdog details violent attack on Hasakah prison

Mustafa Shilani 2022/01/22 13:25

The ISIS militants who attempted to escape, detrained and brought back to the prison. (Photo: social media)

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Rami Abdul Rahman, revealed key details of the violent attack launched by ISIS on a prison facility in the Kurdish-controlled city of Hasakah.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) repelled the attack with the support of air strikes by the US-led coalition.

ISIS has organized its largest attack in recent years to break out of jail terrorist suspects, using suicide bombers and a sustained insurgency campaign, as well as rioting inside the prison, SDF Commander-in-Chief Mazloum Abdi said in a tweet. He added that the US-backed forces repelled the attack, secured the area, and captured all fugitives.

However, SOHR director Rami Abdul Rahman said that clashes between the Kurdish security forces and ISIS assailants are ongoing. "The prison has not been controlled yet. The human losses are very large," he told Kurdistan 24 from London.

"Hundreds of ISIS [suspects] managed to escape, not 10 or 20," he added, noting that the SDF re-captured at least 130 of them, while dozens of others remain on the run. Abdul Rahman also said that about 40 ISIS members and 23 prison guards, and Kurdish security forces were killed in clashes.

Five civilians were also reportedly killed, and about 50 prison guards were wounded.

This is the second time since last December that ISIS militants have attacked in an attempt to free members of the prison, which is considered the largest, where the Syrian Democratic Forces are holding at least five thousand detainees, including prominent leaders of the organization.

The attack on the prison coincided with another attack by ISIS in neighboring Iraq, which killed at least 11 soldiers, including an officer, in a village in Diyala Province.