Syrian monitor SOHR estimates more than 370,000 dead in war: Reuters
The number of dead in Syria's five-year-long war is estimated at more than 370,000, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights activist group has said, raising its toll for documented deaths to more than 270,000.
Pentagon, CIA Chiefs Don’t Think Russia Will Abide by Syria Cease-Fire: WSJ
U.S. President Barack Obama’s top military and intelligence advisers don’t believe Russia will abide by a cease-fire agreement announced today in Syria and want the administration to ready plans to increase pressure on Moscow by expanding covert support to rebels fighting the Russian-backed Assad government, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford, and Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan have voiced increasingly hawkish views towards Moscow in recent White House meetings, jointly calling for new measures to “inflict real pain on the Russians," a senior administration official said.
Islamic State tightens grip on Syrian gov't road to Aleppo: Reuters
IS militants are reported to have tightened their grip on a Syrian government supply route to Aleppo as the army battled to retake the road, which is important to its campaign to retake the city, Reuters reports.
Heavy Russian air strikes are also said to be targeting one of the last roads into opposition-held parts of Aleppo.
IS claims control over strategic village in southern Aleppo province
A media group aligned to Islamic state is claiming that the militants have overrun the village of Khanaser in southern Aleppo province in Syria.
16-year-old Swedish woman rescued by Kurds went to Syria after being 'misled' by IS
The Kurdistan Regional Security Council has issued a press release with further details about a young Swedish woman rescued from the Islamic State group in northern Iraq.
The woman, identified as Marlin Stivani Nivarlain is from the town of Boras in Sweden. She travel to Syria after being misled by an Islamic state member in Sweden. She later travelled to Mosul in Iraq.
The Kurdistan Region Security Council was asked by Swedish authorities and members of the woman's family to help locate her and rescue her from the Islamic State group. The rescue took place on February 17. The woman is now in Iraqi Kurdistan a later return Sweden.
Kurds say they liberated Swedish woman from IS near Mosul
Kurdish counter terrorism forces in northern Iraq are saying that they released a 16-year-old Swedish woman, Marlin Stivani Nivarlain, from the IS group near Mosul.
Russia, U.S. agreement on Syria ceasefire bodes well for political settlement: Pushkov
An agreement between the United States and Russia over a halt in fighting in Syria to start Feb. 27 is "creating serious conditions" for the shift from military to political settlement in the war torn country, the Chair of the Russian Foreign Affairs Committee of the State Duma Alexei Pushkov has said.
"This is an attempt to correctly address the issue of compliance with the UN Security Council resolution. And just as in the case of Iran, we can see that this is creating serious conditions for a transition from military means to using political means," Pushkov said.
"However, of course, we will have to overcome a great deal of complexities, starting with the fact that the military position of a whole range of groups from the so-called moderate opposition is intertwined with the position of the Al-Nusra Front, and it is going to be hard to draw a line on the map between them."
Turkey welcomes Syria plan but not optimistic on peace talks
Turkey has welcomed a plan to halt the fighting in Syria but is not optimistic that peace talks on a political resolution will have a positive outcome, Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus has said, according to Reuters.
Syria ceasefire requires 'halting support to armed groups': Damascus
Syrian state news agency SANA has more details of the Syrian government's response to a ceasefire proposal to start Feb. 27.
SANA quotes an official source at the Syrian Foreign Ministry as saying that Damascus "accepts the cessation of fighting actions on the basis of continuing the military efforts for combating terrorism against IS, the Al-Nusra Front and other Al-Qaeda-linked terrorist organizations according to the Russian-U.S. agreement."
The source added that for ensuring the success of cessation of fighting actions on the scheduled day: Saturday 27/02/2016, the Syrian government affirms readiness to continue to coordinate with the Russian side for identifying the areas and the armed groups that are to be included in the cessation along the period it is in effect.
The source noted that the Syrian government stresses the importance of border curbing, halting support provided by some countries to the armed groups and preventing these organizations from boosting their capabilities or changing their positions as to avoid anything that may undermine this agreement.
It asserted that the Syrian government is adherent to the right of its armed forces to retaliate any violation committed by these groups against the Syrian citizens or its armed forces as well.
Italy agrees to let anti-IS drones depart from Sicily: Reuters
Italy has agreed to let armed U.S. drones take off from an air base in Sicily on a case-by-case basis for defensive missions against IS militants in North Africa, Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has said, Reuters report.
"If it is a matter of operations against terrorists, against potential Islamic State attackers, there is a close relationship between us and the other allies, above all the Americans," Renzi said in an interview with RTL radio.