People sit near a fully loaded in Madama near the border with Lybia on January 1, 2015. French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian paid a surprise visit to northern Niger on January 1, to visit a base being built to combat the growing flow of weapons and jihadists from neighbouring Libya. Le Drian travelled from Chad to Madama, a desert outpost about 100 kilometres from Libya, where he saw in the New Year with troops at a French base. Madama is situated on the route used by jihadists and arms smugglers in southern Libya to reach northern Mali and Niger. (Photo by Dominique Faget/AFP Photo)

A man carries an injured child amidst rubble near a burning vehicle in a site damaged from what activists said was shelling by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in the town of Douma, eastern Ghouta in Damascus, Syria December 30, 2015. (Photo by Bassam Khabieh/Reuters)

Iraqi Shiite fighters from the Hashed al- Shaabi (Popular Mobilisation) paramilitaries hold a position near the village of Tal Abtah, south of Tal Afar, on November 30, 2016, during a broad offencive by Iraq forces to retake the city Mosul from Islamic State group jihadists. (Photo by Ahmad Al- Rubaye/AFP Photo)

A Syria Democratic Forces (SDF) fighter comforts a civilian who was evacuated with others by the SDF from an Islamic State-controlled neighbourhood of Manbij, in Aleppo Governorate, Syria, August 12, 2016. The SDF has said Islamic State was using civilians as human shields. (Photo by Rodi Said/Reuters)

Iraqi army soldiers attempt to move their truck stuck in the mud near the village of Al-Boutha al-Sharqiyah, west of Mosul, on December 2, 2016, during a broad offencive by Iraq forces to retake the main hub city from Islamic State group jihadists. (Photo by Ahmad Al-Rubaye/AFP Photo)

Damaged buildings are pictured at night in Aleppo, Syria December 11, 2015. (Photo by Ammar Abdullah/Reuters)

People walk in the Old City of Damascus, Syria, decorated for the upcoming Christmas holidays, Tuesday, December 14, 2021. (Photo by Omar Sanadiki/AP Photo)

An injured girl reacts at a site hit by an airstrike in the rebel-held Douma neighbourhood of Damascus, Syria November 7, 2016. (Photo by Bassam Khabieh/Reuters)