BEIRUT (AP) – The U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led forces battling the Islamic State group in Syria say they have captured the city hospital in Raqqa, which served as an IS headquarters.
The facility was one of the militants’ last holdouts in Raqqa and had doubled as a hospital and an IS command center.
The capture of the hospital on Tuesday leaves IS militants cornered in and around the notorious municipal stadium in Raqqa, once the group’s de facto capital.
Musafa Bali, a spokesman for the Syrian Democratic Forces, says 22 IS militants were killed in the advance on the hospital. He says fighting is still underway with militants who had refused to surrender.
Raqqa’s stadium also served as an arms depot and one of the Islamic State militants’ largest jails in their self-styled caliphate.