PHOTO: A displaced family sits at a checkpoint as smoke rises from burning oil wells in Qayyarah, about 50 km south of Mosul, October 23, 2016 (Marko Drobnjakovic/AP)
Iraqi and Kurdish forces claimed more advances against the Islamic State, as their offensive to recapture Iraq’s second city Mosul entered its second week.
Shelling ISIS positions, Iraqi special forces tried to push forward from Bartella, a historically Christian town to the east of Mosul that they recaptured last week. They moved into the village of Tob Zawa, about 9 km (5.5 miles) from Mosul, claiming that they freed 30
more than 30 people sheltering in a school.
To the north of Mosul, Kurdish peshmerga are still surrounding Bashiqa, a key town for the movement of ISIS personnel and supplies.
Kurdish officials initially said on Monday that they had retaken the town, near a base for training of Sunni Arab militia and peshmerga by Turkish troops. However, they later pulled back the claim, saying that “a few” ISIS suicide bombers may still be inside Bashiqa.
On the southern front, the Iraqi Federal Police advanced into a small village in the Shura district.
Call for Inquiry Into Killing of Civilians by Airstrike
Human Rights Watch has called for an investigation into last Friday’s apparent airstrike, killing at least 13 people and wounded, on the women’s section of a Shia mosque.
The strike on the town of Daquq came as Islamic State fighters launched bomb and gun attacks inside the nearby city of Kirkuk.
Daquq’s residents said they heard planes flying overhead just before the bombing.
The US denied responsibility. Iraqi Brigadier-General Yahya Rasool, the spokesman for the Joint Military Command, said the Iraqi government is investigating. He declined to say whether Iraqi or US-led coalition planes were flying in the area at the time of the explosion.
