KHAZER, Iraq — Daesh (the so-called IS) militants have deployed suicide car bombs and fired mortar rounds to slow down the advance of Iraqi troops outside a key town near the militant-held city of Mosul, an Iraqi army officer said Wednesday.
The officer from the 9th Division told The Associated Press that his troops were now around 1 kilometer (half mile) away from Hamdaniyah, a historically Christian town also known as Bakhdida.
Since Tuesday, Daesh has sent 12 car bombs, all of which were blown up before reaching their targets, he said, adding that Iraqi troops suffered a small number of casualties from the mortar rounds. The officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters, did not provide specific figures.
Iraq launched a massive operation on Monday to retake Mosul, the country’s second largest city and the extremist group’s biggest urban bastion.
The operation is the largest launched by the Iraqi army since the 2003 US-led invasion. Some 25,000 troops, including Sunni tribal fighters, Kurdish forces known as the peshmerga and state-sanctioned Shiite militias known as the Popular Mobilization Units are approaching the city from different directions.
The participation of the Shiite militias in the operation to retake the mainly Sunni Mosul has raised concerns that the campaign could inflame sectarian tensions. Rights groups have accused the Shiite militias of abuses in past campaigns against Daesh-held areas.
In a bid to alleviate those concerns, Shiite militia leaders on Tuesday announced that they will only focus on capturing the mostly Shiite town of Tal Afar to the west of Mosul, and not enter the city itself.
“The only troops who will enter Mosul are the army and police, not the Popular Mobilization Units or the peshmerga,” said Hadi Al-Amiri, the leader of the Badr Brigade, one of the largest Shiite militias. “This has been agreed upon,” he said at a press conference in the Shiite city of Najaf.
Amnesty International said in a report released Tuesday that Iraqi government and paramilitary forces detained, tortured or killed hundreds of Sunni Arab civilians fleeing Daesh-held areas during the operation to retake the Sunni city of Falluja, west of Baghdad, earlier this year.
The Iraqi government has denied any systematic violations by security forces or the militias, and says individuals have been held accountable for occasional abuses.
Meanwhile, Popular Mobilization said late on Tuesday it would back Iraqi government forces advancing toward Tal Afar, about 55 km west of Mosul.
Taking Tal Afar would effectively cut off the escape route for militants wanting to head into neighboring Syria and would please the Iran-backed army of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. It has accused the US-led anti-Daesh coalition of planning to allow the militants such a safe passage.
But it could also hamper the escape of civilians from the area of Mosul, which is Iraq’s second biggest city and where the militants are reportedly trying to use residents as human shields.
Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi said on Tuesday that blocking the road to Syria was the responsibility of the coalition that is providing air and ground support to Iraqi and Kurdish troops engaged in the battle.
Tal Afar’s pre-war population of about 150,0000 to 200,000 was a mix of Sunni and Shiite ethnic Turkmens until Shiites fled the town after Daesh militants took over the region in 2014, declaring a “caliphate: over swathes of Iraq and Syria.
