madaresharghi [1]
Iraqi forces have driven the Daesh terror group from central Tal Afar and its historic citadel, they said Saturday, placing them on the verge of fully recapturing one of the last Daesh strongholds in the country.
The advance, just days into an assault on the strategic town, comes six weeks after Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory over the terrorists’ in second city Mosul, where the terror group declared its “caliphate” in 2014, AFP reported.
“Units of the Counter-Terrorism Service liberated the Citadel and Basatin districts and raised the Iraqi flag on top of the citadel,” operation commander General Abdulamir Yarallah said in a statement.
The CTS and federal police units had also seized three northern districts and the Al-Rabia neighborhood west of the citadel, a day after taking the district of Al-Talia to the south.
Clashes were ongoing on the northern outskirts and Iraqi forces were dealing with final pockets of terrorists inside the city, Yarallah said.
Government troops and units of the Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary coalition launched the assault on Sunday after weeks of Iraqi air strikes.
Tal Afar sits on a strategic route between Daesh-controlled territories in Syria and Mosul, 70 kilometers (40 miles) further east.
Progress there has been far more rapid than in Mosul, Iraq’s second city, which fell to Iraqi forces in July after a grueling nine-month battle.
Officials have said they hope to announce victory in Tal Afar by Eid al-Adha, the Muslim holiday set to start in Iraq on September 2.
Most of Tal Afar’s 200,000 residents, the majority of them Shia Turkmens, fled as the terrorists arrived.
Pro-government forces faced an obstacle course of roads blocked with earth embankments and strategically-parked trucks, as well as sniper fire and mortar shelling.
Troops also said they discovered a network of underground tunnels used by the terrorists to launch attacks behind lines of already conquered territory, or to escape.
The International Organization for Migration said “thousands of civilians” had fled Tal Afar since the offensive began.
Once Tal Afar is retaken, Baghdad is expected to launch a new offensive on Hawija, 300 kilometers north of Baghdad.
Daesh is also present in the vast western province of Anbar, where it controls several zones along the Syrian border with war-ravaged Syria, including the Al-Qaim area.
The terror group has lost much of the territory it controlled and thousands of its members have been killed.
The foreign and defense ministers of France visited Baghdad Saturday to affirm their country’s support in the fight against Daesh.
Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and Defense Minister Florence Parly arrived in the Iraqi capital on Friday evening.
French forces have carried out air and artillery strikes in support of Iraqi operations.
“As long as our common enemy has not been eradicated, France will continue to take part” in the campaign, Parly said.
Â