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A woman rests near rubble in the Syrian town of Darat Izza in Aleppo Province on February 28.
A woman rests near rubble in the Syrian town of Darat Izza in Aleppo Province on February 28.

Live Blog: Tracking Islamic State

Follow all of the latest developments as they happen.

Latest News For February 29

-- The United States Army's elite Delta Force is on the verge of beginning operations to target, capture or kill top IS operatives in Iraq, after several weeks of covert preparation, an administration official with direct knowledge of the force's activities told CNN.

-- Syrian government forces have regained control of a road used by the army to access Aleppo, after making advances against Islamic State fighters, a monitoring group and state television reported.


-- Authorities in Iraq say the death toll from a double bombing at a market in Baghdad’s Shi’ite neighborhood of Sadr City rose to 73 on February 29 after several critically wounded victims died overnight.

-- Tajik media are reporting that a woman known to be the second wife of Gulmurod Halimov, the fugitive Tajik colonel who defected to the IS group, has left for Syria along with the couple's four young children.

-- The UN is poised to begin delivering aid to people living in besieged areas of Syria, making use of a truce brokered by the United States and Russia. The first deliveries are planned for Feb. 29, with aid due to reach about 150,000 Syrians in besieged areas over the next five days.

-- A truce negotiated between Syrian rebels and the government has caused a dramatic decrease in airstrikes around rebel-held territory, but there were few celebrations, with many residents suspecting a trick, CNN report.

* NOTE: Live blog posts are time-stamped according to Central European Time (CET).

10:23 5.1.2016

A London man says that the child shown at the end of the latest IS propaganda video is his grandson. His claim has not been independently verified.

Henry Dare told Britain's Channel 4 News that he recognized the child as Isa, the son of his daughter Khadijah, who has joined the IS group in Syria.

"I can't disown him. He's my grandson. I know him very well," Dare said.

10:20 5.1.2016

The BBC has been told by an "official source" that a British man named Siddhartha Dhar is the focus of investigations into the latest propaganda video by the IS group.

The video purports to show the killing of five men IS claimed were spies.

"A lot of people think it is him," the source said, although there has been no official confirmation.

Mr Dhar, also known as Abu Rumaysah, fled Britain in 2014 while on bail.

The father-of-four, from Walthamstow in east London, had been arrested on suspicion of encouraging terrorism, but later travelled to Syria after being bailed.

10:15 5.1.2016

About 100 Pakistanis have travelled to Syria and Iraq to join the IS group, Punjab province Law Minister Rana Sanaullah has said.

“The government is doing its best to stop the recruitment for the IS,” Sanaullah said.

22:15 4.1.2016

We are now closing the live blog for today. Join us again tomorrow morning for all the latest news concerning the Islamic State group.

22:09 4.1.2016

18:20 4.1.2016

The IS group is holding a number of Albanian children whose fathers were killed fighting in Syria, and refusing to let them go home, the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) says.

BIRN has seen documents showing that 31 children including 23 minors were taken to Syria, and that some of them are now orphaned or fatherless.

Eva and Endri Dumani, aged nine and seven, are two of the 31 Albanian children left fatherless by the war in Syria.

Shkelzen Dumani was killed while fighting for [IS] on November 5, 2014, nine months after he took his children to Syria without informing his wife.

In Syria, Dumani changed his children’s names to Sara and Talha. Since his death, despite the efforts of the family and the Albanian authorities, his children have not been allowed to return home.

18:12 4.1.2016

The IS group has executed a female journalist, Ruqia Hassan, in its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa, Syria Direct reports.

Better known by her pseudonym "Nisan Ibrahim," Hassan wrote about life under IS rule on her personal Facebook page and "often reported on airstrikes in Raqqa as they happened," Furat al-Wafaa, an independent citizen journalist formerly with the Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently media campaign, tells Syria Direct’s Ammar Hammou.

Syria Direct tweeted this photograph of Hassan.

18:08 4.1.2016

The IS group in Libya is claiming responsibility for shooting down a MiG 21 military plane targeting militant groups near the eastern city of Benghazi.

However, Nasser al-Hassi, a spokesman for the Al-Karamah operations room in Libya, says that the plane went down because of a hydraulic system failure.

The pilot of the downed plane ejected, senior army commander Fadel al-Hassi told Reuters.

17:44 4.1.2016

The destruction of Syria's chemical weapons stocks declared by the Syrian Arab Republic is complete, according to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

OPCW's Director General, Ambassador Ahmet Üzümcü, said that the process "closes an important chapter in the elimination of Syria's chemical weapon program as we continue efforts to clarify Syria's declaration and address ongoing use of toxic chemicals as weapons in that country."

17:25 4.1.2016

The IS group has set up departments to handle "war spoils," including slaves, and the exploitation of natural resources such as oil, Reuters reports.

The hierarchical bureaucracy, including petty rivalries between officials, and legal codes in the form of religious fatwas are detailed in a cache of documents seized by U.S. Special Operations Forces in a May raid in Syria that killed top IS financial official Abu Sayyaf. Reuters has reviewed some of the documents.

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