At least 104 detainees, including 24 women, were freed in a prisoner swap with regime forces as a part of an evacuation deal reached last month to deport fighters from the powerful Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham from a Lebanese border enclave, activists said on Saturday.
The former Al-Qaeda affiliate, in return, has freed four Hezbollah militants and the bodies of two fighters.
Two weeks ago, around 9,000 Syrians, including jihadists and their families, crossed from Lebanon into northern Idleb province as part of a cease-fire deal between HTS and Hezbollah.
The Islamic State (ISIS) and the Nusra Front, which rebranded and now leads the HTS group, took over large swaths of the Lebanon-Syria border region in 2014.
Hezbollah, together with the Lebanese army, has waged a military campaign to recapture the territory. In recent weeks, the militia says it has regained control of around 95 percent of the area, culminating in the cease-fire deal, which was agreed last week.
This article was edited by The Syrian Observer. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author.
