Syria: jihadists hidden in tunnels surrender after the end of the "caliphate"

At the foot of the hill overlooking what was the last shrapnel of ISIS "caliphate" in eastern Syria, an AFP team saw dozens of men advancing in single file to climb several trucks.

ISIS jihadists hiding in tunnels until the last hours of the "caliphate" surrendered on Sunday, the day after the announcement of the fall of ISIS's latest coup in Baghouz, a militia Kurdish.

At the foot of the hill overlooking what was the last shrapnel of ISIS "caliphate" in eastern Syria, an AFP team was able to see dozens of men advancing in single file under a fine rain to climb in several trucks. "They are IS fighters who came out of the tunnels and surrendered today" (Sunday), told AFP Jiager Amed, a media officer of the People's Protection Units (YPG). This Kurdish militia is the backbone of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which led the ground struggle against IS with the help of an international coalition.

"There may be others hidden in the tunnels." There are mainly men in the line: some have beards provided and are wrapped in thick "abayas" (traditional coats), others wear on the head a red and white keffiyeh, have seen, from a distance, the journalists of AFP. The SDS forbade them to approach these men. "We do not know their numbers, there may be others hidden in the tunnels," said Jiager Amed.

Sunday afternoon, in a heavy misty sky rise also volutes of black smoke, "ammunition warehouses (of the IS) that burn," according to the spokesman YPG. Bottles of gas and water cannons litter the hard-fought terrain of jihadists on the banks of the Euphrates River near the Iraqi border. Some of the makeshift tents in which the IS fighters lived are just large enough to allow an adult to hang around there.

The SDF announced on Saturday that it had defeated the jihadists in Baghouz, putting an end to the "caliphate" proclaimed by IS in 2014, which extended to its heyday over vast territories in Syria and Iraq. The ultimate anti-jihadist offensive had been slowed by the release of tens of thousands of people from the last IS pocket. Since January, more than 66,000 people have left Baghouz and its surroundings, according to the SDS. Fighters are arrested and jailed while jihadist families are sent to Kurdish-run IDP camps in northeastern Syria.