Salahuddin

On Saturday, the Iraqi police department announced that thirteen Islamic State militants were killed in an attack against security troops in Salahuddin. “Based on intelligence information, Salahuddin Operations Command and the troops from the province’s police, backed by army jets, carried out an operation in al-Shiha village, west of Tikrit. The operation left thirteen militants killed, seven of them were sheltering in a tunnel”, as the department said in a statement. On Friday, twelve Islamic State militants who attempted infiltration from Hamreen mountains toward Tuz Khurmatu region were killed and injured too. The department also added that a rest house of the militants, food supply and TNT explosive were destroyed. Earlier on the day, Iraqi army launched a wide-scale operation to recapture al-Rummana and Rawa regions. Having recaptured Hawija in Kirkuk, Mosul and Tal Afar in Nineveh as well as Annah and Qaim towns in Anbar, Iraqi troops still have only Western Anbar’s towns of Rawa and Qaim remain under the militants’ control: both have been held by the extremist group since 2014, when it occupied one third of Iraq to proclaim the “Caliphate”.