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Iraq launches major anti-IS operation after killings
BAGHDAD, July 4, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Iraqi forces launched a major operation
against remnants of the Islamic State group on Wednesday following public
anger over the jihadists’ murder of a group of abducted civilians.
Dubbed “Vengeance for the Martyrs”, the operation will see army, special
forces, police and Kurdish peshmerga fighters hunting down IS cells in the
centre of the country, Iraq’s Joint Operations Command (JOC) said in a
statement.
It comes after the bodies of eight IS captives were found late last month
along a highway north of Baghdad. Some of the abductees had appeared in a
video in which IS threatened to execute them unless Baghdad released female
prisoners.
The JOC statement said army, federal police, special forces, peshmerga
fighters and the Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary force had launched “a vast
operation to clear out the region east of the Diyala-Kirkuk” highway.
The operation was being supported by the Iraqi air force and the US-led
coalition that intervened against IS in Iraq and Syria after the jihadists
seized control of large parts of both countries in 2014.
One jihadist had already been killed and eight captured, the JOC said, and
equipment including vehicles and bombs destroyed.
The operation marked the first time that federal Iraqi forces and the
peshmerga were working together since clashes following last year’s Kurdish
independence referendum.
Iraq declared victory over IS in December after expelling the jihadists
from all major towns and cities in a vast offensive.
But the Iraqi military has kept up operations targeting mostly remote
desert areas from where jihadists have continued to carry out attacks.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had vowed to avenge the eight civilians
killed by IS and ordered the execution of hundreds of convicted jihadists.
Thirteen jihadists on death row were executed last week.
BSS/AFP/MRI/1530 hrs