Local Editor

The so-called "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" [ISIL] announced it had executed seven men, two of them by crucifixion, in its bastion in the Syrian city of Raqa.

"ISIL" said on Tuesday that it held the seven responsible for a grenade attack on one of its militants earlier this month in the city of Raqa, AFP reported.

The opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights posted a photograph of the two prisoners being crucified at the roundabout with passer-bys walking past apparently unfazed.

One of them, blindfolded and with his head spattered with blood, had a banner wrapped around his body proclaiming: "This man fought against Muslims and threw a grenade in this place."

The group also carried out three executions in the Raqa provincial town of Tal Abyad, and two more in the town of Saluq, the Observatory said.

The monitoring group said they were not the first crucifixions by "ISIL." On April 16, its militants executed a man for theft from another man in the same way.

"ISIL" has now been forced out of much of northern Syria but its insurgents remain entrenched in Raqa- the only provincial capital entirely outside Syrian government control- and much of its surrounding province.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team