Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has vowed to rid the entire country of Daesh in 2016, shortly after government forces liberated the city of Ramadi from the militant group.
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On Tuesday, Iraqi security forces reported progress in recapturing some areas in the western city of Ramadi, 80 miles west of Baghdad, from IS militants. The military spokesperson said that the insurgents are still dug into pockets of the city west of Baghdad. “We are coming to liberate Mosul and it will be the fatal and final blow to [ISIL]”.
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The greatest criticism has come from Iran, directed specifically at the killing of 57-year-old Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr. Saudi Arabia carried out more than 150 executions last year, the highest figure recorded by human rights groups for 20 years.
The group still controls large stretches of Iraq and neighboring Syria, including most of the rest of Anbar and the large, densely populated city of Mosul in the north of Iraq.
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Transport Minister Gopal Rai said all arrangements were in place to handle the situation on Monday when all offices open. Traffic police were quick to fine them a steep 2,000 rupees (40 USA dollars).
Monday’s recapture of the government complex is certainly likely to lift the morale of Iraqi forces, who were badly shaken by the city’s fall in May, which came despite months of US-led air strikes and advances against IS elsewhere in the country.
He specifically praised the Shiite militia forces for liberating Ramadi, although his remarks contradicted earlier reports that such armed groups, known as the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMG), did not play a role in taking back the Sunni city. Soldiers slaughtered sheep in celebration in nearby damaged buildings.
Baghdad has said for months it would prove its forces’ rebuilt capability by rolling back militant advances in Anbar, a mainly Sunni province stretching from Baghdad’s outskirts to the Syrian border.
In 2006, when US troops battled for control of Ramadi, the government compound was a key focus of fighting.
That said, the defeat of Islamic State in Iraq is clearly going to be a long-term project. “Peshmerga is a major force; you can not do Mosul without Peshmerga”, he insisted. Their efforts were also backed by U.S.-led airstrikes.
“We didn’t expect them to retreat from a number of Ramadi areas today, where we entered without any resistance, as if they evaporated”, he said.
“The real challenge now will be how to enable residents to return to the city while preventing Islamic State from reinfiltrating sleeper cells who could launch attacks either against security forces or against local tribes they consider to be pro-government”, said Nathaniel Rabkin, managing editor of risk assessment newsletter Inside Iraqi Politics. It is imperative to state that the ISIS group still controls much of northern and Western Iraq.
Ramadi’s strategic location on the highway that connects Iraq with Syria and Jordan made it a prized target for ISIL, which took the city in May. Baghdad was quick to announce a counteroffensive to retake the city, but attempts repeatedly stalled.
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Brig. Gen. Hamid al-Fatlawi, commander of the Iraqi army’s 8th division, said that Iraqi forces had seen limited direct combat around the complex, but that Islamic State had used suicide bombers and vehicle bombs to try to fend off the assault before its militants fled.
