https://www.voanews.com/a/lull-in-fighting-lets-islamic-state-families-flee-fighters-surrender/4813577.html

WASHINGTON —

Hundreds of Islamic State fighters and family members fled the northeastern Syrian village of Baghuz, taking advantage of a pause in ferocious fighting with the U.S.-backed forces that have surrounded the last patch of the terror group's self-declared caliphate.

Officials with the Syrian Democratic Forces, Kurdish militias and human right monitors confirmed the exodus late Monday, though the number of fighters and civilians varied.

Monitors with the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said about 150 IS fighters surrendered to the SDF, part of a group of about 400 people that left the ever-shrinking enclave on the banks of the Euphrates River.

The observatory said by the end of the day, as many as another 1,200 people had left.

One official with the YPG, a Kurdish militia that has supported the U.S.-backed offensive on Baghuz, told VOA many of the fighters and family members came from Central Asian countries, such as Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. But the official said he did not know how many more fighters or civilians were still hiding in tunnels underneath the village.