A Syrian military operation against loyalists of ousted President Bashar al-Assad has been completed, the defence ministry said on Monday, after the heaviest fighting since former rebels seized power three months ago. Clashes between Assad loyalists and the country’s new Islamist rulers in the former president’s coastal heartland have killed more than 1,000 people, mostly civilians, according to a war monitoring group. The violence has increased concerns about the direction of Syria, where the former rebels under Ahmed al-Sharaa and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group are attempting to unify a divided country while navigating the involvement of powerful neighbours.
