Wednesday, 18 February, 2015

Egyptian special forces have allegedly launched a ground attack in Libya’s Islamic State-held Derna capturing dozens of Islamist militants, according to Egyptian and Libyan reports.
Ansa news agency cited unnamed local sources as saying that an Egyptian commando stormed the eastern Libyan town, a stronghold of the Islamic State (Isis) there, “capturing 55 Daesh [IS] militants”.
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Around 20 Islamist militants attacked a checkpoint in Tunisia’s central Kasserine region, killing four police officers and stealing their weapons, the government said on Wednesday.
Okba Ibn Nafaa, a small brigade of al-Qaeda-affiliated fighters operating in mountains along the Algerian border, were behind Tuesday night’s attack, interior ministry spokesman Mohamed Ali Aroui told reporters.
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Islamic State terrorists burned forty-five people to death in the ISIS-held town of Al-Baghdadi, a local police chief told the BBC.
Last week, the Islamic State captured much of the strategically important town, which is located just five miles from Ain al-Asad air base, where 320 U.S. Marines are training Iraqi forces to combat ISIS. “The Iraqi soldiers are undergoing a six-week program of advanced combat training,” Stars And Stripes reports.
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Tuesday, 17 February, 2015

Provincial officials said a group of suicide bombers attacked a police station in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing at least 22 officers and wounding 18 others.
One attacker blew himself up at the gate of the headquarters in Pul-i-Alam, about 60 kilometers south of the capital, Kabul, provincial government spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh said.
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Russia-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine claimed Tuesday to have taken the key transportation hub of Debaltseve as both parties faced a deadline to start pulling back heavy weapons from the front line.
Fierce fighting on Tuesday appeared to be focused on Debaltseve, a government-held town surrounded by rebel forces that both sides claim to be on their side of the cease-fire line. The issue was not resolved under a cease-fire agreement negotiated last week by the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France.
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