11 Iraqi fighters killed in Daesh attack: Sources
SAMARRA: At least 11 fighters from Iraq’s statesponsored Hashed Al Shaabi force were killed in an ambush by the Daesh north of the capital on Saturday, Hashed security sources said.
The rebels used light weapons and the cover of darkness to target the Hashed east of Tikrit, the capital of Iraq’s Salahaddin province, two days ater a twin suicide atack claimed by the group killed 32 people in Baghdad.
“Daesh launched an atack on the Hashed’s Brigade 22,” said one of the unit’s officers Abu Ali Al Maliki.
Maliki told AFP the brigade commander was among those killed before reinforcements from the federal police came to the unit’s aid.
Hashed security sources said the total toll was 11 dead and 10 wounded.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but security sources interviewed by AFP blamed Daesh.
Iraq declared the group territorially defeated in late 2017, but has continued to batle extremist sleeper cells, mostly in the country’s mountainous and desert areas.
Local troops have been aided by a Us-led coalition, which first intervened to help fight Daesh in 2014 and continues to provide training, surveillance and air strikes in support of anti-extremist operations.
The coalition has significantly drawn down its troop numbers over the past year, with the US shrinking its force from 5,200 to 2,500.
Local and Western sources have expressed concern over the readiness of Iraq’s security forces, who have been worn down by the spread of Covid-19, political infighting and corruption.
This week’s atacks may be more illustrative of those accumulated shorfalls than any significant Daesh comeback, experts have said.
Following the Us-led invasion in 2003, Iraq’s security forces had to be effectively rebuilt from the ground up, relying heavily on training by foreign armies.
But with Covid-19 spreading fast through Iraq’s bases, coalition troops put a halt to all training operations.
Military sources and observers also cited political divisions within local security forces between units trained by the US and those - like the Hashed - who have received support from Iraq’s powerful neighbour Iran.
Navigating those tensions has been a major challenge for Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhemi, seen as being friendly with the US.