Syrian army destroys rebel ship on Euphrates

The Syrian army has destroyed a ship carrying armed rebels on the Euphrates River in the northeast of the country, state news agency SANA reported on Saturday. "An armed forces unit destroyed a ship on the Euphrates carrying terrorists with arms and ammunition," SANA reported, without providing further details. It was the first time Syrian state media had reported such an incident on the Euphrates, which runs from the mountains of southeastern Turkey through Syria and Iraq. In Syria the river passes through the cities of Deir Ezzor, Raqa and Albu Kamal, all of which have seen regime air strikes or clashes between rebels and troops loyal to President Bashar Assad. The Syrian army has destroyed a ship carrying armed rebels on the Euphrates River in the northeast of the country, state news agency SANA reported on Saturday. "An armed forces unit destroyed a ship on the Euphrates carrying terrorists with arms and ammunition," SANA reported, without providing further details. It was the first time Syrian state media had reported such an incident on the Euphrates, which runs from the mountains of southeastern Turkey through Syria and Iraq. In Syria the river passes through the cities of Deir Ezzor, Raqa and Albu Kamal, all of which have seen regime air strikes or clashes between rebels and troops loyal to President Bashar Assad. Meanwhile, Regime forces had "gradually advanced over the past 10 days to regain control of several villages that fell in (early) October to the rebels to the west of the Damascus-Aleppo highway," Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Britain-based Observatory, told Agence France Presse by phone. The army recaptured a stretch of the highway from the rebels, but had so far failed to enter the Idlib province town of Maaret al-Numan, said Abdel Rahman. The battle for the town has intensified after soldiers in the besieged nearby military base of Wadi Deif recently received supplies of food and ammunition, he added. After days of fierce fighting, the rebels took control of Maaret al-Numan on October 9, and cut off the highway two days later, choking the flow of troops to the north. The opposition forces have since been laying siege to the Wadi Deif base, the largest military facility of its kind in the northwestern province that borders Turkey. Syria's army uses the highway to send reinforcements to the commercial hub of Aleppo, which since mid-July has been one of the main focuses of the country's nearly 20-month civil war.