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A woman rests near rubble in the Syrian town of Darat Izza in Aleppo Province on February 28.
A woman rests near rubble in the Syrian town of Darat Izza in Aleppo Province on February 28.

Live Blog: Tracking Islamic State

Follow all of the latest developments as they happen.

Latest News For February 29

-- The United States Army's elite Delta Force is on the verge of beginning operations to target, capture or kill top IS operatives in Iraq, after several weeks of covert preparation, an administration official with direct knowledge of the force's activities told CNN.

-- Syrian government forces have regained control of a road used by the army to access Aleppo, after making advances against Islamic State fighters, a monitoring group and state television reported.


-- Authorities in Iraq say the death toll from a double bombing at a market in Baghdad’s Shi’ite neighborhood of Sadr City rose to 73 on February 29 after several critically wounded victims died overnight.

-- Tajik media are reporting that a woman known to be the second wife of Gulmurod Halimov, the fugitive Tajik colonel who defected to the IS group, has left for Syria along with the couple's four young children.

-- The UN is poised to begin delivering aid to people living in besieged areas of Syria, making use of a truce brokered by the United States and Russia. The first deliveries are planned for Feb. 29, with aid due to reach about 150,000 Syrians in besieged areas over the next five days.

-- A truce negotiated between Syrian rebels and the government has caused a dramatic decrease in airstrikes around rebel-held territory, but there were few celebrations, with many residents suspecting a trick, CNN report.

* NOTE: Live blog posts are time-stamped according to Central European Time (CET).

10:02 14.12.2015

Breaking news from AFP -- French police are saying that a teacher has been attacked in the Paris suburbs by a man citing the IS group.

10:01 14.12.2015

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said this morning that the IS group was spreading from its stronghold on the Libyan coast to the interior of the country with the aim of getting access to oil wells.

"They are in Sirte, their territory extends 250 kilometers along the coast, but they are starting to penetrate the interior and to be tempted by access to oil wells and reserves," Le Drian told RTL radio.

10:00 14.12.2015

A detachment of the Turkish troops deployed in northern Iraq are today leaving the Bashiqa camp close to the Islamic State-held city of Mosul and moving north, a Turkish military source told Reuters this morning.

The move comes after Baghdad said it would ask the U.N. Security Council to order the Turkish troops out of Iraq.

09:58 14.12.2015

Turkey's foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said that Ankara's patience with Russia "has a limit" after Moscow's "exaggerated" reaction to a weekend naval incident between the two countries, Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported this morning.

A Russian destroyer fired warning shots at a Turkish vessel in the Aegean on Sunday to avoid a collision and summoned the Turkish military attache over the incident..

"Ours was only a fishing boat, it seems to me that the reaction of the Russian naval ship was exaggerated," Mevlut Cavusoglu said.

Tensions between Russia and Turkey have soared since the Turkish air force downed a Russian warplane near the Syrian border on November 24.

20:48 13.12.2015

That concludes our live-blogging of the crisis surrounding Islamic State for Sunday, December 13. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage.

20:00 13.12.2015

17:44 13.12.2015

14:14 13.12.2015

14:09 13.12.2015

Russia Says Fire Warning Shots At Turkish Vessel

The Russian Defense Ministry says one of its warships was forced to fire warning shots to avoid a collision with a Turkish ship in the Aegean Sea.

The Defense Ministry said that it had summoned the Turkish military attache over the incident earlier on December 13.

The Interfax news agency said that the Turkish vessel, which the ministry did not name, had failed to respond to earlier warnings but had sharply changed course after shots were fired before passing within 500 meters of the Russian warship.

Relations between Russia and Turkey have plunged since November 24 when a Russian warplane was downed by a Turkish F-16 near the border with Syria, killing one of the pilots.

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP
13:33 13.12.2015

Islamic State-linked group claims deadly Pakistan market bombing

Islamabad (dpa) -- A hard-line Sunni group linked to Islamic State claims responsibility for a bombing that killed 17 members of the Shiite community in northwestern Pakistan.

The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi al-Alami group says the attack was to punish the Shiite community for sending its members to Syria to fight with forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.

"This is our revenge for joining Iran in war in Syria," Ali bin
Sufian, a man calling himself spokesman of the group, wrote to dpa.

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