Four Russian servicemen killed in militant shelling in eastern Syria
The Russian Defense Ministry says four of its servicemen have lost their lives after foreign-sponsored Takfiri terrorists launched an attack against an artillery battery of the Syrian army in the country’s eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr.
According to reports, the ministry said in a statement on Sunday that two Russian military advisers, who directed the fire of the Syrian battery, were killed on the spot, while five more sustained injuries and were taken to a Russian military hospital to receive treatment.
Two servicemen succumbed to their grave injuries shortly afterwards.
The statement added that some 43 militants were killed in the ensuing clashes, which lasted for around an hour, without saying exactly when or where the fighting occurred.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights later claimed that nine Russian soldiers alongside at least 26 Syrian army troopers had been killed in the Wednesday attack.
Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP "several groups" of militants had attacked Syrian government forces near the town of Mayadin, located about 44 kilometers southeast of the provincial capital city of Dayr al-Zawr, and that some Russian nationals were with them at the time.
A group of Russian private military contractors, who were helping Syrian and Russian forces in the drive against Takfiri terrorists in Dayr al-Zawr, were killed in early February when they came under attack by US forces.
On October 3, 2017, Russia's Defense Ministry denied that two Russian soldiers had been captured by the Daesh Takfiri terrorists in Syria.
“There have been no incidents involving the capture or losses among military servicemen of Russia's armed forces in the province of Dayr al-Zawr or in other areas in Syria,” Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted a defense ministry official as saying at the time.
Captain Nikolay Afanasov was killed on July 12 last year by "sudden mortar fire on a Syrian government army camp" in Syria’s western-central province of Hama.
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