“The expulsion of ISIS (another name for Islamic State) by Iraqi security forces, supported by our worldwide coalition, is a significant step forward in the campaign to defeat this barbaric group and restore Iraq’s territorial sovereignty”, US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said. Gen. Yahya Rasool announced in a televised statement that Ramadi had been “fully liberated”.
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The former government headquarters in Ramadi was the epicentre of the fighting but Iraqi forces did not rush in when ISIS pulled out because the entire area was rigged.
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Iraqi state TV was replaying Monday’s footage from Ramadi, showing troops, some waving Iraqi flags and others brandishing machine guns, chanting and dancing inside what it described as the government complex in central Ramadi. Iraqi military forces on Monday retook a strategic government complex in the city of… IS fighters have retreated from about 70 per cent of city, but still control the rest and government forces still don’t fully control numerous districts from which the IS fighters have retreated.
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Ramadi, located about 130 kilometers (80 miles) west of Baghdad, and nearby Fallujah, which lies half-way on the road to Baghdad and remains under IS control, saw some of the heaviest fighting of the eight-year US intervention in Iraq.
One Iraqi official estimated that about 1,000 Islamic State militants were killed in the weeks leading up to Ramadi’s takeover.
“This great victory has broken the back of Daesh and represents a launchpad for the liberation of Nineveh”, Salim al-Juburi said in a statement.
Abadi did not make it clear whether Mosul would be the next battle or whether Iraqi forces would seek to retake other towns and cities first.
Daesh has seized large areas in Syria and Iraq and declared a caliphate there under the rule of Sharia law.
Al-Belawi said the fighters retreated mainly to the eastern neighborhoods of Sijariya and Sufiya.
With President Barack Obama’s military strategy against Islamic State facing criticism as inadequate, especially from Republican president candidates, USA officials portrayed the progress in Ramadi as part of a broader success story.
Gen. Lloyd Austin III, the head of the U.S. Central Command, congratulated Iraqi forces on the “important operational achievement”.
The Iraqi authorities did not divulge any casualty figures for federal forces but medics told AFP that close to 100 wounded government fighters were brought to Baghdad hospitals on Sunday alone.
The northern and western parts of Iraq have been plagued by gruesome violence ever since Daesh mounted an offensive in the country in June 2014. It also marked a critical test for Iraqi troops, as they’ll likely be called on to do it again in the fight for Mosul, a city also bisected by the Euphrates River.
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The battle for Ramadi was waged partly by Sunni tribesmen whom US troops had trained to fight alongside the forces of the Shiite-dominated government.
