US-backed forces say advancing against IS in Syria's Raqa

US-backed forces said Monday they had seized a new neighbourhood from the Islamic State group in the jihadist stronghold of Raqa in northern Syria.The Syrian Democratic Forces, an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, have been pressing an operation to capture the jihadist stronghold since last year, and entered the city in June."The Al-Yarmuk district was liberated yesterday," the SDF's spokeswoman for the Raqa operation Jihan Sheikh Ahmed told AFP.