Iraqi army take mosque landmark from IS forces

symbolic – from its pulpit, IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in July 2014 declared a self-styled “caliphate” on IS-held territories in Syria and Iraq.

Iraqi and coalition officials said IS blew up the mosque complex last week.

IS has blamed a US air strike for the destruction.

After months of fighting, the IS hold in Mosul has shrunk to less than 0.8 square miles of territory but the advances have come at considerable cost.

“There are hundreds of bodies under the rubble,” said special forces Major Dhia Thamir, deployed inside the Old City.

Mr al-Aridi acknowledged that some civilians have been killed by air strikes and artillery in the fight for the Old City.

“Of course there is collateral damage, it is always this way in war,” he said.

“The houses are very old,” he said, referring to the Old City, “so any bombardment causes them to collapse completely.” BERLIN will tell Ankara that a rally by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan when he visits Germany for the G20 summit is “not possible”, Germany’s foreign minister said.

On Wednesday, Turkey officially requested permission for Mr Erdogan to address Turks in Germany on the sidelines of his visit to the summit, which is being held in Hamburg.

The request comes at a time when relations between Germany and Turkey are frayed over a range of issues, and when German police resources are stretched by security for the G20.

News agency dpa reported Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said during a visit to Moscow yesterday: “We are telling Turkey we are convinced such an appearance in Germany is not possible.”

Mr Gabriel said he had

Recep Tayyip Erdogan wants to address Turks.

told his Turkish counterpart weeks ago that “we don’t think this is a good idea”.

He said “Mr Erdogan is an important guest at the G20 and will be received with all honours by us there. But we believe everything that goes beyond that is inappropriate at this time.”

Mr Erdogan last addressed supporters in Germany in May 2015.

Germany has a large ethnic Turkish minority.

Earlier this year, Mr Erdogan accused Germany, and Chancellor Angela Merkel, of “committing Nazi practices” after some local authorities blocked appearances by Turkish ministers hoping to campaign in Germany ahead of Turkey’s referendum on expanding presidential powers. THE Syrian government and its ally Russia have accused Washington of concocting a “provocation” in Syria, which would then be blamed on President Bashar Assad’s government as an alleged use of chemical weapons to justify an attack.

In a statement carried by the official news agency, Syria’s Foreign Ministry said it rejects US allegations Syria was preparing for a chemical weapons attack, describing such claims as “misleading” and “completely baseless”.

It said the objective of such allegations was to “justify a new aggression on Syria under ill-founded pretexts, similar to what happened in April when the US struck a Syrian air base”, which it said had been used to stage a chemical attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun that killed nearly 90.

Earlier this week, the White House warned that