It "is highly unlikely" that Washington will team up with Syrian President Bashar Assad to crush IS, a US Department of State official said.

Axar.az reports that the United States is unlikely to work with Syrian President Bashar Assad on a campaign to defeat ISIS, a senior Department of State official said Tuesday.

"In terms of cooperating with Assad fighting ISIS, I think that is highly unlikely," the official told reporters.

Since 2011, Syria has been engulfed in a civil war, with government forces fighting against numerous opposition and terrorist groups, including al-Nusra Front and ISIS, banned in a range of countries, including Russia.
The US-led coalition of 68 nations started to carry out airstrikes against ISIS in Syria and Iraq in 2014, with the strikes in Syria not being authorized by the government of Bashar Assad or the UN Security Council.