ISLAMIC STATE MILITANTS,PLANTED ABOUT 3,000 MINES RECENTLY IN PALMYRA SYRIA.

                     A Syrian officer told pressmen that Islamic State militants retreating from Palmyra,laid thousands of mines that they planned to set off simultaneously as the army moved in.The officer said main streets and side roads in Palmyra had been rigged with explosives weighing up to 50 kg.More than 3,000 had already been safely detonated since government forces,backed by Russian jets,retook the city on sunday.He did not say why the Islamic State fighters failed to set off the explosives before pulling out,but his assertion echoed comments from Syria's antiquities chief,who said the militants intended to dynamite a greater area of the city's 2,000  year old ruins than they already had.The officer,who did not give his name,said the bombs left behind were linked so they could go off together.Islamic State's defeat in Palmyra was not only a significant military victory for President Bashar al-Assad,opening up the country's central desert to government forces and their allies.It also cast the Syrian army as an effective fighting force against jihadists bent on cultural vandalism and wanton killing.Another source told press men today that the troops had identified 45 bodies in a mass grave in Palmyra,including civilians and Syrian army members captured by Islamic State.One more photo below.