Borders Reopen TEHRAN (Iran News) – A border crossing on a vital highway linking the capitals of Iraq and Syria, seized by ISIL terrorists in 2014, re-opened on Monday, a report said. On Monday, an AFP video journalist saw trucks hauling cargo across the terminal, which lies on a major highway connecting Baghdad and Damascus. […]
Borders Reopen
TEHRAN (Iran News) – A border crossing on a vital highway linking the capitals of Iraq and Syria, seized by ISIL terrorists in 2014, re-opened on Monday, a report said.
On Monday, an AFP video journalist saw trucks hauling cargo across the terminal, which lies on a major highway connecting Baghdad and Damascus.
Close to the Euphrates river in Iraq’s Anbar province, Al-Qaim faces Albu Kamal in Syria’s vast eastern region of Deir Ezzor. Borders reopen in this region.
It is the only crossing between the two countries controlled by Syrian forces on one side and Iraqi troops on the other.
Iraqi forces backed by the Hashed al-Shaabi troops declared victory over the terror group in late 2017.
“The opening of Boukamal-Qaim crossing is a victory for Syrian and Iraqi friendship against takfiri terrorism,” read a banner placed on the Syrian side of the border, a reference to the extremist ideology of the IS.
Some 800 freight lorries were expected to cross from Syria once the crossing has been opened, Syria’s state news agency said.
Qaim was once a thriving stopover on the highway linking Damascus and Baghdad.
Long before a hard border materialised in the latter half of the 20th century, tribes sent their grooms and brides across the frontier to marry, extending the branches of their families on both sides.
- source : Tasnim, Irannews
