US-led strikes on ISIS-run Syrian prison leaves dozens dead

Almost 60 people have been killed in a US-led coalition air strike on a prison run by the Islamic State in eastern Syria

The United States has since late 2014 led a coalition against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria
The United States has since late 2014 led a coalition against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria

US-led coalition air strikes killed nearly 60 people at a Syrian prison run by the Islamic State group, a monitor said Tuesday, as Washington insisted the jihadists remain its only target.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor ,said 42 prisoners and 15 militants died when the facility near Mayadin, in Deir al-Zour province, was hit at dawn on Monday.

The Deirezzor24 news website, which is run by an activist collective, reported that the facility was located near the village of Tayibiya wa al-Maaharufa, and that it had once been the home of a commander of al-Nusra Front, an al-Qaeda-linked group now known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

The coalition has been hitting ISIS in Syria and Iraq since mid-2014 but has also been involved in recent confrontations with President Bashar al-Assad's forces, raising fears of the United States being drawn into Syria's civil war.

The White House on Monday accused Assad's regime of preparing a potential chemical attack and warned it would pay a "heavy price", but Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said Washington was determined to keep a strict focus on fighting ISIS.

Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP news agency that the strikes killed 42 prisoners and 15 jihadists in Mayadeen, a large town in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor.

Most of Deir Ezzor province is controlled by the militants and it has been the target of air strikes by both the coalition and the Syrian army and its Russian ally.

US intelligence officials believe IS moved most of its leaders to the town in recent months as Iraqi government forces advanced into the Iraqi city of Mosul and a US-backed alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters encircled the Syrian city of Raqqa.

The US-led coalition said last week that it had killed ISIS's top cleric Turki Binali in a 31 May strike on Mayadeen.