A Roman amphitheater in the ancient city of Palmyra has been partially destroyed by ISIS fighters, the Syrian state news agency reported Friday.

According to CNN, Syrian news agency SANA reported that "ISIS destroyed the facade of the Roman theater and the Tetrapylon in the ancient city of Palmyra."

Syrian state news also reported that 12 civilians were executed by ISIS militants in Palmyra on Thursday, CNN said.

Palmyra is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. ISIS first seized control of the amphitheater in May 2016, CNN reported. Syrian regime forces briefly expelled the militants out of the city last year, but ISIS regained control again in December when the army pulled out of the city. </s> Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The Roman Theatre's pillared portico is shown here intact in March 2016

Militants from the Islamic State group have destroyed part of the Roman Theatre in the ancient city of Palmyra.

Syria's antiquities chief said the tetrapylon - a group of four pillared structures which were mainly modern replicas - has also been ruined.

The jihadists recaptured the Unesco-listed archaeological site in December from government troops.

The head of the UN cultural body said the destruction was "a new war crime".

Its director general, Irina Bokova, said what she described as "cultural cleansing by violent extremists" had resulted in "an immense loss for the Syrian people and for humanity".

IS destroyed other monuments after it first seized Palmyra in May 2015.

The group held the site and nearby city known locally as Tadmur for 10 months.

Interactive See the damage to the ancient ruins 10 January 2017 26 December 2016

The militants were forced out by a Russian-backed government offensive in March 2016, but regained control while pro-government forces where focused on battling for the city of Aleppo late last year.

Maamoun Abdulkarim, the head of the Syrian government's Antiquities Department, told the Associated Press that reports of the latest destruction first trickled out of Palmyra late in December, and then satellite images which became available late on Thursday confirmed it.

The US-based American Schools of Oriental Research posted the images on its Facebook page, saying only two of the tetrapylon's columns remain, and the monument appeared to have been intentionally destroyed using explosives.

Only one of the structure's columns is original, as the others were rebuilt in 1963.

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Most of the pillars of the tetrapylon were reconstructed in 1963, but one was original

On Thursday, a monitoring group said IS militants had beheaded four people and shot eight others dead outside a museum close to the archaeological site.

The militants have previously carried out killings in the Roman Theatre.

When they first held the archaeological site, they blew up temples, burial towers and the Arch of Triumph, believing shrines and statues to be idolatrous.

They also destroyed the Temple of Bel - the great sanctuary of the Palmyrene gods - which had been one of the most important religious buildings of the 1st Century AD in the East. </s> BEIRUT, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Islamic State militants have destroyed one of the most famous monuments in the ancient city of Palmyra, the Tetrapylon, and the facade of its Roman Theatre, Syrian antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim told Reuters on Friday.

Islamic State control the Palmyra site after capturing it in December for a second time from Syrian government forces.

Government forces and their militia allies, backed by Russian air power, had taken back the city from Islamic State last March after first losing it in 2015. </s> The destruction by Islamic State jihadists of two key cultural sites in Syria’s ancient city of Palmyra is a “war crime”, UNESCO said Friday.

“This destruction is a new war crime and an immense loss for the Syrian people and for humanity,” Irina Bokova, director general of the UN cultural agency, said in a statement following reports that IS destroyed Palmyra’s tetrapylon monument and the facade of the city’s Roman amphitheatre.

“This new blow against cultural heritage… shows that cultural cleansing led by violent extremists is seeking to destroy both human lives and historical monuments in order to deprive the Syrian people of its past and its future,” Bokova said.

IS recaptured Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage site, from government forces on December 11 and the new devastation reportedly occurred earlier this month.

The jihadist group had already ravaged the city during the nine months it held the site before being expelled in March last year.

The tetrapylon, built during the rule of the Roman Emperor Diocletian in the third century, consisted of four sets of four pillars each supporting massive stone cornices.

The monument had suffered considerable damage over the centuries and only one of the 16 pillars was still standing in its original Egyptian pink granite. The rest were cement replicas erected in 1963.

The Roman amphitheatre dates to the first century and was used by IS for public executions during its occupation of the city between May 2015 and March 2016.

Before being forced out of Palmyra in a Russian-backed offensive in March, IS razed world-famous temples and tower tombs at the site. </s> Daesh militants have destroyed one of the most famous monuments in the ancient city of Palmyra, the Tetrapylon, and the facade of its Roman Theatre, Syrian antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim told Reuters on Friday.

The Assad regime lost control of Palmyra (Tadmur) to Daesh in December, the second time the terrorist group had overrun the UNESCO world heritage site in the six-year-long Syrian conflict.

The Tetrapylon, marking a junction along Palmyra's grand colonnade, comprises a raised stone platform with matching structures of four columns positioned at each of its corners.

Satellite imagery sent by Abdulkarim to Reuters showed it largely destroyed, with only four of 16 columns still standing and the stone platform apparently covered in rubble.

The imagery also showed extensive damage to monuments on the stage of the Roman Theatre, with several towering stone structures apparently also destroyed.

Abdulkarim said if Daesh remained in control of Palmyra "it means more destruction". He said the destruction took place sometime between Dec. 26 and Jan. 10, according to the satellite imagery of the site.

Daesh had previously captured Palmyra in 2015, and held it for 10 months until regime forces backed by allied militia and Russian air power managed to drive them from the city last March. However, the terrorist group recaptured the city on Dec. 11, 2016 as Assad regime pulled out its forces from the area to crush moderate opposition groups in Aleppo, which succeeded in late December amid massive civilian casualties.

During its previous spell in control of Palmyra, Daesh destroyed other monuments there, including its 1,800-year-old monumental arch. Palmyra, known in Arabic as Tadmur, stands at the crossroads of the ancient world. </s> The Islamic State group has demolished more treasured monuments in Syria's ancient Palmyra, a month after recapturing it from government forces, the country's antiquities chief said Friday.

The news is a fresh blow for the UNESCO World Heritage site, which had already been ravaged by the jihadist group during the nine months it held the site before being expelled in March last year.

"Local sources told us that 10 days ago Daesh destroyed the ," a 16-columned structure that marked one end of the ancient city's colonnade, Maamoun Abdulkarim told AFP using an Arabic acronym for IS.

"Yesterday (Thursday), we received satellite photographs from our colleagues at Boston University showing damage to the facade of the Roman amphitheatre," he added.

Before being forced out of Palmyra in a Russian-backed offensive in March, IS razed world-famous temples and tower tombs at the site.

The , built during the rule of the Roman Emperor Diocletian in the 3rd Century AD, consisted of four sets of four pillars each supporting massive stone cornices.

The monument had suffered considerable damage over the centuries and only one of the 16 pillars was still standing in its original Egyptian pink granite. The rest were cement replicas erected by the antiquities department in 1963.

The Roman amphitheatre dates to the 1st Century AD and was used by IS for public executions during its occupation of the city between May 2015 and March last year.

"From the first day, I was bracing myself for a terrible outcome," Abdulkarim said.

"We had already witnessed the terror of the first occupation and frankly I had never thought that the city would be occupied for time."

- Strikes kill 40 jihadists -IS recaptured Palmyra late last year as Syria's government waged a fierce battle to take back all of the northern city of Aleppo from rebel forces.

The surprise fall of Palmyra, in the central province of Homs, gave IS a propaganda boost as it faced twin assaults on two of its key strongholds -- Raqa in Syria and Iraq's second city Mosul.

Syrian forces have battled to prevent further IS advances around Palmyra, and on Thursday fierce clashes between pro-government fighters and jihadists near a military airport in the region left 30 dead, a monitor said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 12 regime forces and 18 IS militants had been killed in the fighting by the Tayfur military airport in Homs province.

Despite its progress around Palmyra, IS lost nearly a quarter of its territory in Syria and Iraq last year, the research firm IHS Markit said Thursday.

The jihadist group is just one of the many forces involved in Syria's complex conflict, which began with anti-government demonstrations in March 2011 and has killed more than 310,000 people since then.

The war has drawn in foreign powers including Russia and a US-led coalition battling IS and other jihadists.

Late Thursday, air strikes killed more than 40 jihadists from the former Al-Qaeda affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front in the west of Aleppo province, the Observatory said.

But the Britain-based monitor said it was not able to determine if the strikes were carried out by Russian or coalition aircraft.

Fateh al-Sham, known previously as Al-Nusra Front, is excluded from a fragile nationwide ceasefire in place in Syria since December 30.

- Peace talks next week -The truce, brokered by regime ally Russia and rebel backer Turkey, is intended to pave the way for fresh peace talks in the Kazakh capital Astana beginning January 23.

The nature of the talks remains murky, and there has been indication the two sides have shifted their positions since previous rounds of failed negotiations.

President Bashar al-Assad, speaking to Japan's TBS television in an interview released in full Friday, appeared to dismiss the possibility of a transitional government or his resignation.

Both are key demands of the opposition.

"In our there's nothing called transitional government," Assad said.

"Whoever wants the president to leave, they can go to the ballot box," he added, saying the issue was "not something we discuss either with the opposition or with any other country."

"I'm not the reason of the problem."

Assad also reiterated his hope that US President-elect Donald Trump, who will be inaugurated later Friday, could be a partner going forward.

"We hope that they are genuine to forge a real and realistic alliance to fight the terrorists in the region, and that of course will include Syria first of all," he said. DM </s> In this Wednesday, March 1, 2017 frame grab from video provided by the government-controlled Syrian Central Military Media, Syrian forces take up positions during fighting between Government forces and Islamic State group militants in the ancient city of Palmyra, near Homs, Syria.

BEIRUT — Syrian government forces battling the Islamic State group re-entered Palmyra on Thursday in their quest to again take the historic town they had lost to the militants in December, state media reported.

The SANA news agency reported that government troops entered the town's archaeological site, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, around mid-day, then the town itself, as IS militants fled the area.

The Syrian government's push has relied on the support from Lebanon's militant Hezbollah group and Russian air cover, according to Hezbollah's media outlets.

IS defenses had begun to crumble on Sunday, with the government troops reaching the town's outskirts on Tuesday.

Activist-run Palmyra News Network said the advancing forces pounded the desert town — famed for its ancient Roman monuments and grand stone theater — with artillery and airstrikes during the day.

This is the government's second campaign to retake the desert town. It seized Palmyra from Islamic State militants last March only to lose it again 10 months later. Before the civil war gripped Syria in 2011, Palmyra was a top tourist attraction, drawing tens of thousands of visitors each year.

The town, according to Mohammed Homsi, the director of the activist-run Palmyra News Network, is almost entirely deserted. Islamic State fighters reportedly evacuated the last of their relatives on Sunday, he said.

Archeologists have decried what they say is extensive damage to its ruins.

Drone footage released by Russia's Defense Ministry earlier this month showed new damage to the facade of Palmyra's Roman-era theater and the adjoining Tetrapylon — a set of four monuments with four columns each at the center of the colonnaded road leading to the theater.

A 2014 report by a U.N. research agency disclosed satellite evidence of looting while the ruins were under Syrian military control. Opposition factions have also admitted to looting the antiquities for funds.

The IS group has twice used the town's Roman theater as a stage for mass killings, most recently in January, when they shot and beheaded a number of captives they said had tried to escape their December advance. Other IS killings were said to have taken place in the courtyard of the Palmyra museum and in a former Russian base in the town.

The developments in Palmyra came against the backdrop of Syrian peace talks which are underway in Geneva but without any tangible breakthroughs so far. Diplomats and negotiators have set their sights on modest achievements in the latest round of negotiations, after a week of discussions centering on setting an agenda for future talks.

On Thursday, U.N. Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura is due for another round of meetings with both the government delegation and opposition groups.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told reporters Wednesday that "the parties have agreed to ... discuss all issues in a parallel way, on several tracks." After a Damascus request, the issue of terrorism is also on the table, he had said.

Russia is a key sponsor of Syrian President Bashar Assad's government in Damascus.

A top Syrian opposition negotiator, Nasr al-Hariri, said the talks would likely culminate in a closing ceremony on Friday and the parties may be back in Geneva for further discussions in a few weeks.

Setting the agenda and strategy to guide discussions has proven difficult as the main conflicting parties dig in their heels over form and semantics.

In Turkey, the country's foreign minister said that with the completion of an operation to retake the IS-held town of al-Bab in northern Syria, Turkish troops will head to the Syrian town of Manbij next, to oust U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish forces that Ankara views as terrorists and a threat to Turkey.

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Thursday that Turkey would not shy away from attacking the Kurdish group that dominates the Syria Democratic Forces, which captured Manbij last year after weeks of deadly fighting with IS.

He renewed calls for the new U.S. administration not to support the Kurdish forces. Cavusoglu stressed that an operation to take Manbij had not started yet, but acknowledged that skirmishes between Turkish-backed forces and the Kurdish fighters may have occurred.

That front line in northern Syria was further complicated by a concurrent announcement by the Syrian Kurdish side on Thursday that they had agreed with Russia to withdraw from some of the territory between al-Bab and Manbij to make room for a buffer.

The Manbij Military Council, part of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, said that under the deal, they will withdraw from a front line as the rival Turkish-backed forces near the Euphrates River. This will allow Syrian government forces to create a buffer between them.

However, Cavusoglu denied any such agreement was reached, and the Turkish and Syrian authorities have long regarded each other with thinly-veiled hostility.

There was no immediate comment from the Syrian government.

In other developments, German authorities arrested a Syrian national on suspicion of murdering dozens of civil servants in Syria in 2013. They said the suspect could stand trial for war crimes. An associate of the man was also arrested. The two men reportedly belonged to an al-Qaida-linked faction fighting the Syrian government.

Associated Press writers Dominique Soguel in Geneva, Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin, and Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria, contributed to this report. </s> Syrian government forces battling the militant Islamic State (ISIS) group re-entered Palmyra on Thursday in their quest to again take the historic town they had lost to the militants in December, state media reported.

The SANA news agency reported that government troops entered the town's archaeological site, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, around mid-day, then the town itself, as ISIS militants fled the area.

The Syrian government's push has relied on the support from Lebanon's Hezbollah group and Russian air cover, according to Hezbollah's media outlets.

ISIS defenses had begun to crumble on Sunday, with the government troops reaching the town's outskirts on Tuesday.

Activist-run Palmyra News Network said the advancing forces pounded the desert town famed for its ancient Roman monuments and grand stone theater with artillery and airstrikes during the day.

This is the government's second campaign to retake the desert town. It seized Palmyra from ISIS militants last March only to lose it again 10 months later. Before the civil war gripped Syria in 2011, Palmyra was a top tourist attraction, drawing tens of thousands of visitors each year.

The town, according to Mohammed Homsi, the director of the activist-run Palmyra News Network, is almost entirely deserted. Islamic State fighters reportedly evacuated the last of their relatives on Sunday, he said.

Archeologists have decried what they say is extensive damage to its ruins.

Drone footage released by Russia's Defense Ministry earlier this month showed new damage to the facade of Palmyra's Roman-era theater and the adjoining Tetrapylon a set of four monuments with four columns each at the center of the colonnaded road leading to the theater.

A 2014 report by a UN research agency disclosed satellite evidence of looting while the ruins were under Syrian military control. Opposition factions have also admitted to looting the antiquities for funds.

The ISIS group has twice used the town's Roman theater as a stage for mass killings, most recently in January, when they shot and beheaded a number of captives they said had tried to escape their December advance.

Other ISIS killings were said to have taken place in the courtyard of the Palmyra museum and in a former Russian base in the town.

The developments in Palmyra came against the backdrop of Syrian peace talks which are underway in Geneva but without any tangible breakthroughs so far.

Diplomats and negotiators have set their sights on modest achievements in the latest round of negotiations, after a week of discussions centering on setting an agenda for future talks.

On Thursday, UN Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura is due for another round of meetings with both the government delegation and opposition groups.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told reporters Wednesday that “the parties have agreed to ... discuss all issues in a parallel way, on several tracks.”

After a Damascus request, the issue of terrorism is also on the table, he had said.

Russia is a key sponsor of Syrian President Bashar Assad's government in Damascus.

A top Syrian opposition negotiator, Nasr al-Hariri, said the talks would likely culminate in a closing ceremony on Friday and the parties may be back in Geneva for further discussions in a few weeks.

Setting the agenda and strategy to guide discussions has proven difficult as the main conflicting parties dig in their heels over form and semantics.

In Turkey, the country's foreign minister said that with the completion of an operation to retake the ISIS-held town of al-Bab in northern Syria, Turkish troops will head to the Syrian town of Manbij next, to oust US-backed Syrian Kurdish forces that Ankara views as terrorists and a threat to Turkey.

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Thursday that Turkey would not shy away from attacking the Kurdish group that dominates the Syria Democratic Forces, which captured Manbij last year after weeks of deadly fighting with ISIS.

He renewed calls for the new US administration not to support the Kurdish forces. Cavusoglu stressed that an operation to take Manbij had not started yet, but acknowledged that skirmishes between Turkish-backed forces and the Kurdish fighters may have occurred.

That front line in northern Syria was further complicated by a concurrent announcement by the Syrian Kurdish side on Thursday that they had agreed with Russia to withdraw from some of the territory between al-Bab and Manbij to make room for a buffer.

The Manbij Military Council, part of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, said that under the deal, they will withdraw from a front line as the rival Turkish-backed forces near the Euphrates River. This will allow Syrian government forces to create a buffer between them.

However, Cavusoglu denied any such agreement was reached, and the Turkish and Syrian authorities have long regarded each other with thinly-veiled hostility.

There was no immediate comment from the Syrian government. </s> BEIRUT — The Islamic State group has killed 12 people it held captive in Syria’s ancient Palmyra by shooting and beheading them, with some of the slayings carried out in the city’s second-century Roman amphitheatre, activists said on Thursday.

The extremist group had recaptured the city in December from government troops — nine months after ISIL was expelled from there in a Russia-backed offensive and while Syrian government forces were focused on retaking the eastern half of the city of Aleppo from rebels.

When they previously controlled Palmyra, ISIL militants had used the Roman amphitheatre for public killings, including those in a video showing 25 boys with pistols shooting captured Syrian soldiers, the ancient colonnades visible in the background.

The Islamic State group has also destroyed ancient temples and other relics in the past, triggering fears among experts for remaining antiquities in the city. The city has been largely emptied out of its residents, following the government offensive in March last year.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and another activist network, the Palmyra Monitor, said the 12 captives were killed on Wednesday. They were captured as they tried to escape the ISIL offensive on Palmyra last month.

The Observatory said four teachers and government employees were beheaded in the courtyard of the Palmyra museum. The Observatory and the Palmyra Monitor said the others — four opposition fighters and four pro-government troops — were first shot, then beheaded in the Roman amphitheatre or in a former Russian base in Palmyra.

The Observatory also said Thursday that ISIL militants during an ongoing assault in eastern Syria’s Deir el-Zour province, hung the heads of six pro-government fighters in public, in different parts of the town of al-Mayadeen. There were no bodies attached to the heads, and it was not clear if the six were killed in battle or after they were taken captive.

Over the past year, ISIL has suffered defeats in both Syria and Iraq, losing several towns and cities it had captured in 2014. Its surprise re-taking of Palmyra came weeks before it went on a wide assault in Deir el-Zour, against the government controlled part of the city. Activists said it was the ISIL group’s most aggressive onslaught on the government area and a nearby military air base in a year.

The Islamic State group is feared for its reign of terror and gruesome killings, including beheadings, often carried out in public.
ISIL militants destroy part of Palmyra's ancient Roman theatre.