Thanks in part to a committee formed between the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) and the government that is tasked with reducing tensions in northern Burma, armed clashes between KIO forces and the military have been reduced significantly, said Lahpai Gun Ja, a member of the KIO’s technical team.

“In August there was almost no fighting between the government and the KIO, it was reduced by 95%”, said Lahpai Gun Ja who is based at the KIO’s technical assistance team office in the Kachin state capital Myitkyina.

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Iraqi forces battled Sunday to secure the country’s second-largest dam from Islamic State militants after U.S. airstrikes opened the way for a ground offensive, marking an expansion of the American bombing campaign to Anbar, the deadliest province for U.S. troops during the Iraq war.

Iraqi officials said the ground operation, spearheaded by Iraqi counterterrorism forces and backed up by allied tribesmen, troops and local police, was underway Sunday night in the vicinity of Haditha, about 150 miles northwest of Baghdad. There, militants have been attempting to seize control of the city’s strategic hydroelectric dam for months.

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People watch smoke rising in the distance caused by fighting between members of the Syrian government forces and rebels

Syrian rebels have made fresh advances near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights in Quneitra province, where 26 troops and 17 rebels were killed in a battle on Saturday, a monitoring group said.

Fighting has raged in the province since August, when rebels and the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Al-Nusra Front took control of a border post.

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Syrian air strikes against the northern Islamic State bastion of Raqqa on Saturday killed 53 people, a monitor said, updating an earlier toll and adding that at least 31 of the dead were civilians.

“We have documented the deaths of 31 civilians, among them five women and three children, in Raqqa and its surroundings,” said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman.

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Yemeni security officials and tribal leaders say clashes between Shiite rebels and Islamist tribesmen have killed 40 people over two days in the country’s north.

The officials said Saturday the fighting in al-Jawf province killed 18 of the Hawthi rebels and 22 tribesmen who are backed by an army unit and allied with the Muslim Brotherhood’s Islah party. The battle left dozens of wounded on both sides.

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The US military has killed the leader of an al-Qaida-linked Islamic group in a Somalia airstrike, the Pentagon announced Friday.

“We have confirmed that Ahmed Godane, the co-founder of al-Shabaab, has been killed,” Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby said in a statement. “The U.S. military undertook operations against Godane on Sept. 1, which led to his death. Removing Godane from the battlefield is a major symbolic and operational loss to al-Shabaab. The United States works in coordination with its friends, allies and partners to counter the regional and global threats posed by violent extremist organizations.”

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Ukraine and pro-Russian rebels reached a ceasefire agreement on Friday, the first step toward ending fighting in eastern Ukraine that has caused the worst standoff between Moscow and the West since the Cold War ended.

The ceasefire deal was struck in the Belarussian capital Minsk along with a deal allowing for prisoner exchanges, deliveries of humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of heavy weapons after five months of a conflict that has killed more than 2,600 people.

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