The US has begun reducing its military presence in Syria with a view to eventually closing all but one of its bases there, the US envoy for the country has said in an interview.

Six months after the ouster of longtime Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad, the United States is steadily drawing down its presence as part of Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), a military task force launched in 2014 to fight the Islamic State group (IS).

“The reduction of our OIR engagement on a military basis is happening,” the US envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, said in an interview with Turkey’s NTV late on Monday.

“We’ve gone from eight bases to five to three. We’ll eventually go to one.”

But he admitted Syria still faced major security challenges under interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose Islamist-led coalition to

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