Fallujah ‘fully liberated’ after two years of occupation

IRAQ’S army declared that Fallujah had been “fully liberated” yesterday after the city endured more than two years of Isil rule.

The month-long military operation to retake the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) stronghold is “done”, General Abdul Wahab al-Saadi was reported as saying.

Gen Saadi, who commands the “counter-terrorism forces” which have led the offensive, said his troops had entered the district of al-Julan, which was the last neighbourhood of Fallujah still under Isil control.

Fallujah, 30 miles west of Baghdad, was the first Iraqi city to fall under Isil rule in January 2014, before the jihadi group swept across much of the country’s northern and western provinces and proclaimed its “caliphate” six months later.

In late May, the Iraqi army launched an operation to retake the city, backed by air strikes from the US-led coalition.

More than 80,000 of Fallujah’s inhabitants then fled the city, overwhelming nearby refugee camps.

Aid agencies warned of a humanitarian disaster as Iraqi authorities struggled to accommodate displaced families. Karl Schembri, from the Norwegian Refugee Council, described conditions in the makeshift camps as “apocalyptic”, with poor sanitation and no shelter in the heat of the Iraqi summer. “People are going to die in these camps unless essential aid arrives now,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi security forces have detained about 20,000 people, mainly young males of military age, for “screening” in case they include Isil fighters hiding among fleeing civilians.

So far, 2,185 suspects have been identified, while 11,605 people have been released from the screening process and another 7,000 are still being held. The army has been accused of mistreating and torturing those in detention.

“The treatment was very bad. We had nothing to drink or eat,” said a man who was detained after the recapture of Saqlawiya, a town about six miles from Fallujah. He told Amnesty International that “about four or five men would come into the room and beat people with sticks and metal pipes”.

Haidar al-Abadi, the Iraqi prime minister, announced that a human rights committee would be established to investigate any abuses.