Islam Times - NATO announces AWACS deployment for anti-Daesh coalition

Islam Times - NATO has announced the deployment of sophisticated surveillance aircraft in support of the US-led coalition purportedly battling Daesh in Syria and Iraq.

During a NATO leaders’ summit held in Warsaw on Saturday, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced that plans for sending Western military alliance’s AWACS planes (Airborne Warning and Control System) has been approved.

"We will provide AWACS support and the plan is to have them to flying over international airspace and Turkey and that will allow us to look into airspace in Iraq and Syria," he said.

AWACS planes utilize powerful radar systems to monitor their surrounding airspace for hundreds of kilometers. They are also used as airborne command centers for air operations and bombing missions.

In May, NATO had announced that the planes would not be used to monitor the Takfiri terrorists.

During the summit, Stoltenberg also announced that the alliance would boost its anti-terror operations in North Africa and the Middle East.

He also announced new military training operations in Iraq, adding that a training team will be deployed to Baghdad in the near future.

"To the south we see failed and failing states. And millions left homeless and hopeless by terrorist groups like Daesh," he said.

Since late September 2014, the US, along with some of its allies, has been conducting airstrikes purportedly against Daesh extremists inside Syria without any authorization from Damascus or the United Nations.

The air raids in Syria are an extension of the US-led aerial campaign against alleged Daesh positions in Iraq, which started in August 2014.

Daesh militants have been carrying out horrific acts of violence, such as public decapitations and crucifixions, against all communities, including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, and Christians, in areas under their control in Iraq and Syria.