Syria’s YPG: ISIL Faces Imminent Raqqa Defeat

ISIL is on the verge of defeat in Syria’s Raqqa and the city may finally be cleared of the group’s fighters on Saturday or Sunday, the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia said. “The battles are continuing in Raqqa city. Daesh (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) is on the verge of being finished. Today or tomorrow the city may be liberated,” YPG spokesman Nouri Mahmoud told Reuters news agency by telephone. According to media reports, YPG dominates the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of Arab and Kurdish militias that has been battling since June to defeat ISIL at Raqqa, which served as the group’s de facto capital in Syria.