As Syria's economy plummeted further, the local Kurdish-led authority controlled by U.S.-backed fighters in the country's north said Thursday it was more than doubling the salaries of its employees to make up for the loss of the value of the Syrian pound.
The announcement came a day after Washington imposed a new wave of sanctions, ramping up pressure on Syrian President Bashar Assad and his inner circle with a raft of new economic and travel sanctions for human rights abuses in the country's nine-year civil war.
The Syrian Kurdish administration -- which calls itself the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria -- said the 150% salary raise, starting June 1, would apply to every employee working for the local government. It gave no numbers but the local authority is believed to employee thousands of civil servants.