ISDEI Instituto de Seguridad, Defensa y Estudios Internacionales

Source: https://www.facebook.com/Division11.Tanks/ Russia has delivered a new batch of T-62M battle tanks to the Syrian Arab Army (SAA). The battle tanks were allegedly delivered to the 11th Armoured Division of the SAA, according to new photos appeared online in  pro-government social media accounts . Moscow is actively supplying Syria with T-62M battle tanks and other Soviet military equipment. The supplies of T-62Ms have been reported by various sources since 2015. Source: https://www.facebook.com/Division11.Tanks/

Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani, center, attends a meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Revolutionary Guard commanders in Tehran, Iran, September 18, 2016. (Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader via AP) On August 22, the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) ground force headquarters “Hamzah Sayed al-Shuhda’a” released an official statement denying that the IRGC is planning any joint operation with Turkey against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party also known as the (PKK). “We have not planned for any operations across the borders of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the IRGC said in a statement. President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed on August 21 that Turkey and Iran are planning to launch a joint military operation against the PKK in the near future. Furthermore, Erdogan added that he discussed the PKK threat with the chief of the staff of Iran’s armed forces, General Mohammad Hossein Bagheri last week. “Although the Islamic Repu

On Wednesday, Russian Minister of Defense, Sergey Shoygu announced that the civil war in Syria has de-facto ended because the success of the de-escalation zones initiative. Shoygu emphasized that the de-escalation agreements allowed to focus on fighting terrorist organizations like ISIS and al-Qaeda. The defense minister made this  statement during a meeting with his Lebanese counterpart Yacoub Sarraf. Shoygu stressed the importance of the Russian-Lebanese cooperation and warned that the instability could reach Lebanon. “I would like our Western partners… finally to separate the moderate opposition from terrorists and stop rendering assistance across the board,” Shoygu said. In another development, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that the joint observation center in Jordan began its work on Wednesday. The center will include officials from Russian, the USA and Jordan, and it will monitor the ceasefire in the southern Syria de-escalation zone witch includes Draa and

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) and its allied groups of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) have united efforts with ISIS in an attempt to cut off the Salamiyah-Ithriyah-Khanassir-Aleppo road, the only government supply line to Aleppo city. On August 23 and August 24, HTS artillery units conducted a massive bombardment campaign shelling Syrian Arab Army (SAA) positions along the road. At the same time, ISIS attacked the SAA at Wadi al-Adib and Shayk Hilal and even temporarily cut off the road near as-Saan. Pro-militant sources, including the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), claimed that the SAA suffered a number of tactical setbacks and that ISIS could use the situation in order to recapture a large area in the Uqayrabat pocket. However, then reports started appearing that the SAA, the Qalamoun Shield Forces and the National Defense Forces (NDF), backed up by Russian attack helicopters, launched a counter-attack in the area and r