Isis kidnaps dozens of Assyrian Christians in eastern Syria

Militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis) kidnapped dozens of men, women and children from Syria's Assyrian Christian minority in a surprise attack, activists said, with dozens more missing and thousands fleeing the area.

Activists from Syria's eastern Hassakah region, which is near the Iraqi border and home to a large population of Kurdish and Christian minority groups, say the kidnappings came after the jihadi group known as Isis attacked a string of Assyrian villages early on Monday morning.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group based in the UK, estimated that some 90 people have been kidnapped. Other local activists said they had confirmed 65 kidnappings, including 10 members of a local Christian militia protecting the village. At least 21 others were missing.

"We woke up to the sound of clashing; we didn't know what it was, until we saw that everyone in the camp was fleeing because Isis had entered the village. We heard that in [the village of] Tel Shamiram, they had seized the women and taken them up to the mountain . . . We tried calling them; there was no response," one Assyrian woman said in a video posted by A Demand For Action (ADFA), an advocacy group for minorities affected by Isis, which has seized nearly a third of territory across Syria and Iraq.

Panicked residents fled some 33 villages in the area, which lies near the Khabour river, according to the citizen journalist Mejid Mohammed. The province's Christian patriarchate called on all churches to open their doors to the displaced. Most headed to the province's major cities, Hassakeh and Qamishli, where control is split between Kurdish forces and the Syrian government.

Residents fear an outcome similar to Isis's August offensive in Iraq's Sinjar province, where hundreds from the Yezidi minority were killed and captured. Many women were sold into slavery.

Sudden flights of entire populations have become common in Syria's four-year civil war, which has divided the country into pockets controlled by President Bashar al-Assad, the rebels seeking to oust him, Isis, and Kurdish forces carving out an autonomous region in the northeast, near Iraqi Kurdistan.

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Locals believe the attack on the Assyrian areas was designed to draw in Kurdish forces from other fronts where they are putting Isis under greater pressure.

"The area [under attack] sits along a fork of highways that led to some of its [Isis's] main strongholds, including Tel Abyad, Tel Hamis and Jazaa," Mr Mohammed said, referring to some of the strategic eastern Syrian towns where Isis and Kurdish forces have been fighting for control.

Activists say a major battle has erupted in the region where the kidnappings took place, with Kurdish forces shelling Isis locations and the Sutoro calling in reinforcements.

The ADFA said that some 3,000 Assyrian and Syriac people were bussed out of their villages, and cited reports of activists saying that, similar to what happened to Iraq's Yazidis, the captured men were separated from women and children. It said Isis was attempting to use the men for a hostage exchange with the Kurds. The fate of the women and children remains unclear.

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