"During the past day, the Russian aerospace forces delivered airstrikes on two places of the deployment of militants who left the al-Tanf area and were hiding in hard-to-reach areas of the Al-Bishri ridge in the Deir ez-Zor governorate,"  Oleg Ignasyuk, deputy chief of the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the Opposing Parties in Syria (a division of the Russian defense ministry), said, TASS reported.

According to the 2017 agreement among Iran, Russia, and Turkey as the guarantor countries of the Astana Peace Talks, four safe zones were established in Syria.

Three regions came under the control of the Syrian army in 2018, but the fourth region, which includes Idlib province in northwestern Syria and small parts of Latakia, Hama, and Aleppo provinces, is still under the control of terrorist groups and adversary groups.

At the end of the summer of 2018, the leaders of Russia and Turkey reached an agreement in Sochi, Russia, during which Turkey promised to remove or disarm the terrorists based in this region without bloodshed.