Syria buries 11 soldiers after second deadly blast at a military depot in two weeks

Syria's military held a funeral procession Saturday for 11 soldiers killed a day earlier when an explosion tore through a weapons cache at an army position in the eastern province of Deir Az Zor, the Ministry of Defense said. Nine other soldiers were wounded, according to the provincial government, which said the cause of the blast had not been determined and an investigation was under way.

The explosion struck a Syrian Arab Army position in the town of Ayyash, west of Deir Az Zor city, the official SANA news agency reported, citing the ministry. State broadcaster Al Ikhbiriya said the soldiers were killed while transporting heavy ammunition at the site. Footage aired by the channel showed mourners gathered outside the National Hospital in Deir Az Zor city, from where the procession set out with the bodies wrapped in Syrian flags, Al Jazeera reported.

Toll emerged a day after the blast

The ministry's Media and Communications Department said Friday that an explosion had occurred at one of the army's sites in the Ayyash area and that authorities were investigating the causes and assessing the consequences, without giving a casualty figure, TRT World reported. Al Ikhbiriya said Friday that ambulances and civil defense teams had been sent to the site and that the nature of the blast was not immediately clear. Saturday's announcement of 11 deaths was the first toll released, and the authorities have still not disclosed the circumstances of the explosion.

A recurring hazard

The Ayyash blast was the second at a Syrian military site in less than two weeks. On Sept. 9, an explosion at a temporary depot for weapons and war remnants in Sarmada, in the northwestern province of Idlib, killed 14 soldiers and wounded more than 10 people, including some civilians, the Defense Ministry said at the time. The ministry took responsibility for that incident and said the depot had been used to collect weapons and munitions left over from the civil war ahead of their transfer under standard procedures.

Syria's emergency management minister, Raed al-Saleh, told the local outlet Enab Baladi after the Sarmada blast that his ministry was working with other government bodies to keep such sites clear of civilians, while acknowledging that some locations are difficult to secure fully because civilians take part in collecting abandoned munitions. Earlier, on Sept. 1, a vehicle carrying ammunition exploded in Binnish, also in Idlib province, killing five people and wounding others, according to Syrian state media.

Explosions of this kind have become frequent as the country works through the vast stockpiles of weapons and munitions accumulated during more than a decade of civil war, Al Jazeera reported.

What it means

Three deadly munitions explosions in under three weeks, in two provinces at opposite ends of the country, point to a structural problem rather than an isolated accident: the Syrian state is trying to consolidate and dispose of wartime arsenals with procedures that, by the emergency minister's own account, cannot always keep civilians and untrained handlers away from the material. The Defense Ministry has been consistent in publishing tolls and in accepting responsibility for the Sarmada case, and the fact that it has so far withheld any explanation for Ayyash while an investigation runs means the cause should not be assumed. For Damascus, the cost of the clearing program is now measured in soldiers as well as civilians, and for a government seeking to project control over Deir Az Zor and the east, each such loss at a military site undercuts the message that the army's positions there are secure.