Royal Air Force Typhoon fighter aircraft have operated alongside French warplanes in a coordinated attack targeting an underground arms cache in Syria operated by the Islamic State group (IS), as stated by the UK Ministry of Defence.
The facility, pinpointed through surveillance, was thought to be storing arms and explosives, the release indicated, and was situated in hills just to the north of Palmyra in central Syria.
"Our aircraft employed Paveway IV guided bombs to strike a number of access tunnels leading to the facility... preliminary assessments suggest the objective was successfully hit," officials stated.
There was no sign of any civilian casualties in the attack conducted Saturday night and every plane involved returned safely, the defence officials confirmed.
The British jets were backed up by a Voyager aerial refuelling aircraft.
The Islamic State group - also known as ISIS - established militant control over parts of both Syria and Iraq prior to its 2019 collapse.
"This operation demonstrates our UK leadership, and commitment to work closely with allied nations, to eliminate any resurgence of the terrorist group and their violent and radical beliefs in the area," UK Defence Secretary the minister said.
RAF aircraft have performed patrols over Syrian airspace to "deter any efforts to regroup" of IS following its routing at the Baghuz confrontation in 2019, the MoD reported.
"I must thank all the members of our armed forces who took part in this operation for their professionalism and their courage," he said. "They were among numerous UK service members deployed over the holidays. This operation, to remove terrorist threats who pose a risk to our security, shows how British military are always on standby, all year round, keeping Britain secure within its borders and strong abroad."
During December, the US military carried out what it termed a "large-scale strike" against IS targets in Syria, after an ambush resulted in the deaths of two US troops and a civilian linguist in the Palmyra area.
The UN estimates IS still has roughly 5-7 thousand militants in both countries.
