U.S.-backed Syrian forces on edge amid concern ISIS could try to stage a comeback on heels of Assad's ouster
CBSN
Eastern Syria — CBS News was among the first news outlets to speak on Thursday with Travis Timmerman, an American who was feared dead by family and friends, days after he was freed from a notorious prison in Syria. He said he had spent seven months jailed by the regime of now-ousted dictator Bashar al-Assad before rebels broke down his cell door.
But he was just one of the many thousands of people locked up over half a century of iron-fisted rule by Assad, and his father before him. Many remain missing, and the rebel forces, along with the families of those who've disappeared without a trace, have mounted a herculean effort since Assad fled to Russia on Sunday to find those who vanished.
But there's one group of prisoners that Syria's still-evolving, rebel-led leadership wants to keep behind bars. Five years ago, as U.S.-backed forces wrested control of land held for years by ISIS, CBS News visited a prison where the members of the terrorist group were being held. This week, CBS News returned to the prison in eastern Syria. Guards said it was still holding thousands of ISIS militants, but they wouldn't say exactly how many.
The United Kingdom indefinitely extended a ban on puberty blockers for people younger than 18, barring medication prescriptions used to treat gender dysphoria, the government announced this week. There will be exemptions for people who choose to participate in a clinical trial aiming to study the safety and effectiveness of puberty suppression, which is set to begin next year. Young people already prescribed puberty blockers are allowed to continue taking them, the government said.
A judge was shot dead Wednesday in Mexico's once-thriving beach city of Acapulco, local media and the state prosecutor's office said.
A male humpback whale made one of the longest and most unusual migrations on record for the species, an anomaly scientists say might be linked to climate change.
More than 40 migrants are feared dead off Italy's Lampedusa after a lone 11-year-old survivor said the boat she was on capsized, a rescue group said Wednesday.
Italy's mafias make more than three billion euros a year from the tourism sector and are primed to pocket even more from large-scale upcoming events, a research institute warned on Tuesday.
Foreboding environmental milestones abounded again this year in the Arctic, where experts say dramatic climate shifts are fundamentally altering the ecosystem and how it operates. One recent turning point for the region involves its carbon footprint: Where conditions in the Arctic historically worked to reduce global emissions, they're now actively contributing to them.
Damascus – Syria's capital city was on auto-pilot Tuesday, with no new government in place in the wake of the dramatic rebel offensive that toppled longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad on Sunday. But as the former al-Qaeda offshoot that led that charge put some of its senior figures in charge of a self-declared transitional administration, many Syrians appeared determined to try to get on with business as usual.
Australian former world champion cyclist Rohan Dennis admitted Tuesday to a charge of creating a risk of harm in relation to the December 2023 road death of his Olympian wife Melissa Hoskins.
A Ukrainian man who embarked on a perilous journey fleeing his war-torn country into Romania was rescued from a deep mountain ravine in subzero temperatures with an unlikely companion: his months-old kitten named Peach.
An alleged drug trafficker wanted in connection with an international drug smuggling operation through the Belgian port of Antwerp has been arrested, Dubai police said Monday.
Melbourne — Australian police said Monday they are hunting for three suspects over an arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue, designating it a terrorist act. Mask-wearing attackers set the Adass Israel Synagogue ablaze before dawn on Friday, police said, gutting much of the building. Some congregants were inside the single-story building at the time but no serious injuries were reported.