Trump says US forces cornered IS leader in dead-end tunnel

WASHINGTON (AP):

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the shadowy leader of the Islamic State (IS) group who presided over its global jihad and became arguably the world’s most wanted man, was killed in a United States (US) military raid in Syria, US President Donald Trump said yesterday. He provided graphic details of al-Baghdadi’s final moments as American forces pursued and cornered him and his children in a dead-end tunnel.

“Last night, the United States brought the world’s number one terrorist leader to justice,” Trump announced at the White House. “Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead.”

In a national address, Trump described a night-time airborne raid in Syria’s northwestern Idlib province, with American special operations forces flying over heavily militarised territory controlled by multiple nations and forces. No US troops were killed in the operation, Trump said.

The death of al-Baghdadi was a milestone in the fight against IS, which brutalised swaths of Syria and Iraq and sought to direct a global terrorism campaign from a self-declared ‘caliphate’.

A yearslong campaign by American and allied forces led to the recapture of the group’s territorial holding, but its violent ideology has continued to inspire attacks.

As US troops bore down on al-Baghdadi, he fled into a “dead-end” tunnel with three of his children, Trump said, and detonated a suicide vest. “He was a sick and depraved man, and now he’s gone,” Trump said. “He died like a dog, he died like a coward.”

Al-Baghdadi’s identity was confirmed by a DNA test conducted onsite, Trump said.

Trump had teased a major announcement late Saturday, tweeting that “Something very big has just happened!” By the morning, he was thanking Russia, Turkey, Syria, and Iraq, as well as Kurdish fighters in Syria, for their support.

The operation marks a significant foreign-policy success for Trump, coming at one of the lowest points in his presidency as he is mired in impeachment proceedings and facing widespread Republican condemnation for his Syria policy.

The recent pullback of US troops he ordered from northeastern Syria raised a storm of bipartisan criticism in Washington that the militant group could regain strength after it had lost vast stretches of territory it had once controlled. Trump said the troop pull-out “had nothing to do with this”.

Planning for the operation began two weeks ago, Trump said, after the US gained unspecified intelligence on al-Baghdadi’s whereabouts. Eight military helicopters flew for more than an hour over territory controlled by Russian and Syrian forces, Trump said, before landing under gunfire at the compound.

Trump vividly described the raid and took extensive questions from reporters for more than 45 minutes Sunday. He said US forces breached the walls of the building because the doors were booby-trapped and chased al-Baghdadi into the tunnel, which partially collapsed after al-Baghdadi detonated the suicide vest. Trump also revealed that US forces spent roughly two hours on the ground collecting intelligence.