DAMASCUS: A blast on Sunday from a landmine left by the militant Islamic State group killed 14 people foraging for truffles in the Syrian desert, state media said.

“Fourteen citizens were killed and eight others injured after a landmine left by IS terrorists exploded while they were collecting truffles in the Raqa desert,” said Syria’s official news agency SANA.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor earlier reported that the landmine blast had killed “13 civilians, including women” who were hunting for truffles.

The Syrian desert is renowned for producing some of the best quality truffles in the world, which fetch high prices in a country battered by 13 years of war and a crushing economic crisis.

Authorities frequently warn against the high-risk practice. But every year between February and April, foragers risk their lives to collect the delicacies in the vast northern Syrian desert, or Badia — a known hideout for jihadists that is also littered with landmines.

In March 2019, IS lost its last scraps of territory in Syria following a military campaign backed by a US-led coalition, but jihadist remnants continue to hide in the desert and launch deadly attacks.

They have used such hideouts to ambush civilians, Kurdish-led forces, Syrian government troops and pro-Iran fighters, while also mounting attacks in neighbouring Iraq.

Syria’s war has claimed the lives of more than half a million people and displaced millions since it broke out in March 2011 with Damascus’s brutal repression of anti-government protests.

Published in Dawn, February 26th, 2024