Syrian security forces have reached an agreement to end deadly clashes with a French-led militant faction in the northern province of Idlib, following days of tension around a camp housing foreign fighters.
The Internal Security Forces of Syria’s Ministry of Interior announced on Thursday that they had concluded a truce with the Ghuraba Battalion (”Battalion of Strangers”), a group of French jihadists led by Omar Omsen - also known as Omar Diaby - in the Al-Firdan camp near Harem, northern Idlib.
“The two sides reached an agreement providing for a ceasefire, an end to the state of alert, the withdrawal of heavy weapons to military barracks, and the cessation of inflammatory media campaigns,” a local source told The New Arab’s Arabic edition Al-Araby Al-Jadeed.
The deal, the source said, also included “restraint in public discourse and the transfer of the dispute to the Sharia court of the Ministry of Justice for adjudication”.