Syrian army forces uncovered a vast network of underground tunnels dug by the YPG terrorist group beneath civilian areas in the town of Tabqa, near the Euphrates River, after retaking the area in a recent military operation.
The town, located in Syria’s Raqqa province, had been under YPG control since 2017. Syrian forces regained control of Tabqa on Jan. 18 following an operation that ended years of militant presence in the area, according to local military officials.
The tunnels, stretching for kilometers, were built beneath residential neighborhoods and key civilian sites, including a hospital, a municipal building and a church damaged during earlier fighting. Entrances to some of the tunnels are visible on roads and inside bombed-out buildings along the Euphrates riverbank.
Anadolu Agency (AA) reporters accompanied Syrian army explosive ordnance disposal units as they inspected parts of the tunnel system. Inside, investigators found rocket-propelled grenade warheads, large-caliber shell casings and interconnected passageways leading to different parts of the town.
Syrian forces said some sections of the tunnels were equipped with electricity and arranged like living quarters, including rooms used as dormitories, kitchens and bathrooms. One underground area was described as an operations center. Parts of drones believed to have been used in attacks were also found inside.
A portrait of Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK terrorist group, was seen hanging in one of the underground rooms, according to the soldiers.
Other tunnels were found beneath the remains of a church that was destroyed in 2014 when the area was seized by the Daesh terrorist group.
Syrian troops said the tunnel beneath the church was connected to the wider underground network and contained stored munitions, including mortar shells, drone-dropped explosives and improvised explosive devices.
Military officials said the YPG had planted explosives in several tunnels and surrounding areas before withdrawing, adding that clearance operations were still ongoing and that parts of the network had yet to be fully accessed.
Soldiers noted that the group fled the town in a disorganized manner, leaving behind large portions of the tunnel infrastructure and weapons caches.
The YPG faced a comprehensive offensive by the Syrian army earlier this month when the group failed to honor a deal with Damascus for its integration into the post-Assad army.
Syrian forces first forced out the YPG from two neighborhoods in Aleppo that it occupied and then moved forward to clear out areas west of the Euphrates River, where the YPG maintained control thanks to a security vacuum during the Syrian civil war.
Türkiye supports Syria’s operations against the YPG, though it is not a direct support, unlike cross-border offensives the Turkish army carried out during the Syrian civil war, in order to end YPG occupation in towns near the Turkish border.
The YPG is still a concern for Türkiye, which seeks to end the scourge of terrorism by the PKK through a new initiative. Under the new initiative, the PKK agreed to disarmament, but Ankara aims to expand this disarmament, now largely confined to terrorists in Iraq, to the YPG as well. The terror-free initiative emphasized Turkish-Kurdish unity in a bid to save Kurdish communities spread across Türkiye, Iraq and Syria from the grip of the terrorist group.