5,233 Islamic State fighters were killed in Russian strikes, with the rest of the dead including other fighters, radicals, and terrorists BEIRUT: More than 18,000 people, nearly half of them civilians, have been killed in Russian airstrikes on Syria since Moscow began its game-changing intervention three years ago, a monitor said. Russia, a steadfast ally of Syria’s ruling regime, began carrying out bombing raids in the country on Sept. 30, 2015 — more than four years into the devastating conflict. Since then, they have killed 18,096 people, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. “That number includes 7,988 civilians, or nearly half of the total,” said Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman. Another 5,233 Islamic State fighters were also killed in Russian strikes, with the rest of the dead including other fighters, radicals, and terrorists, the Britain-based monitor said. Russia has operated a naval base in Syria’s coastal Tartus province for decades, but expanded its operations to the nearby Hmeimim air base in 2015. It also has special forces and military police units on the ground in government-controlled parts of the country. The air strikes were crucial in helping troops loyal to President Bashar Assad retake swathes of the country, including second city Aleppo in 2016 and areas around Damascus, the rural center, and the south this year alone. “The regime controlled just 26 percent of Syrian territory” when Russia intervened, said Abdel Rahman, compared with close to two-thirds now. But human rights groups and Western governments have criticized Russia’s air war in Syria, saying it bombs indiscriminately and targets civilian infrastructure. In addition to the Russian and Syrian air forces, warplanes from the US-led coalition fighting Daesh have also been carrying out bombing raids on Syria since September 2014. Last week, the Observatory said that US-led coalition air strikes on Syria had killed more than 3,300 civilians since the alliance began operations against IS targets there in 2014. The Observatory, which relies on sources inside Syria for its reports, says it determines whose planes carried out strikes according to type, location, flight patterns and munitions involved. Also on Sunday, security forces in northern Raqqa city said they had uncovered a Daesh sleeper cell which was plotting series of large attacks across the devastated city. Raqqa served as the de facto capital of Daesh’s self-proclaimed caliphate until it was retaken by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) militia alliance last October. A spokesman for the Raqqa Internal Security Forces set up by the SDF said it had killed two members of a Daesh cell and detained five others during an operation on Saturday. “Special forces and explosives experts carried out a counter operation .. to confront plans which were about to be executed by a terrorist cell affiliated with mercenaries of Daesh in a neighborhood in Raqqa city,” the unit’s spokesman Mohannad Ibrahim said at a news conference. The forces raided two residential apartments where the cell members were hiding and confiscated grenades, pistols and explosives, the spokesman said. They also found a car bomb at the site of the operation and unearthed a large cache of arms and land mines buried nearby. The city has witnessed lately a wave of road side bombings targeting mainly SDF officials and fighters. In June, SDF imposed a three-day curfew in Raqqa and declared a state of emergency saying Daesh militants had infiltrated the city and planned a bombing campaign.