Deadly explosions hit Syria’s Hasakah

Syrian state TV says two car bomb attacks have killed at least 20 people in city regularly targeted by ISIL fighters.

Smoke rises from what activists said were airstrikes in Hasaka city, Syria
Control of Hasakah province is divided between Kurdish groups and forces loyal to Assad [Reuters]

At least 20 people have been killed in two car bomb attacks in the northeastern Syrian city of Hasakah, state television reported.

The broadcaster said they were killed in a blast in the Mahata neighbourhood of the city that followed a first blast in Khashman district.

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State news agency SANA gave different tolls for the blasts, which it said were suicide car bombs.

The agency said five people were killed in Khashman and 12 in Mahata, and also reported that least 70 others had been wounded.

A woman and her two children were among the dead, the Associated Press news agency reported.

The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said the two explosions were suicide car bombs, although it could not immediately confirm a toll.

Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman said the first blast hit a checkpoint belonging to the Kurdish security forces in Khashman, while the second struck the headquarters of a pro-regime militia in Mahata.

Control of Hasakeh city, and other parts of the province by the same name, is divided between Kurdish groups and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.

The city has regularly been targeted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group, which controls some territory in Hasakah province.

The group entered the city and seized several neighbourhoods in June, but was expelled a month later after battles involving both government troops and Kurdish fighters.