Iraqi army closes in on IS militants near Falluja

PanARMENIAN.Net - Iraq's army sought on Monday, June 27 to eliminate Islamic State fighters holed up in farmland west of Falluja to keep them from launching a counterattack on the city, a day after the government declared victory over the militants there, Reuters reports.

Backed by air strikes from a U.S.-led coalition, Iraqi artillery bombarded targets as its troops closed in on up to 150 insurgents in areas along the southern bank of the Euphrates River, an army officer participating in the operation said.

The government's recapture of Falluja, an hour's drive west of the capital, Baghdad, was part of a broader offensive against Islamic State militants, which seized large swaths of Iraq's north and west in 2014, but is now being driven back by an array of forces.

Falluja's recovery lent fresh momentum to the campaign to recapture Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city and the biggest anywhere within the jihadists' self-proclaimed caliphate. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has pledged to retake Mosul this year.

Colonel Ahmed al-Saidi, who participated in Monday's advance, said ground forces were moving cautiously to avoid triggering roadside bombs planted by Islamic State.

The holed-up militants "have two options: either they surrender or they get killed. We want to prevent them catching their breath and attacking our forces with car bombs," he said.

Saidi said radio intercepts suggested the militants were running out of ammunition and he expected them to fold shortly.

The insurgents earlier this month mounted limited resistance to Iraqi forces inside Falluja before scattering after some commanders abandoned the fight, according to Iraqi officials.

A Pentagon spokesman told reporters in Washington that while there were still pockets of resistance, Falluja had been cleared and was under the control of the Iraqi government.

Captain Jeff Davis said the U.S.-led coalition had carried out more than 100 air strikes on Falluja since the ground operation started.

"We certainly know that there will be significant challenges that they'll face as they go through and back clear and remove that city of booby traps, IEDs," Davis said, referring to improvised bombs.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, said in a statement that the Falluja operation had been "a significant challenge for the ISF and for the coalition", and the task of looking after the displaced residents of Falluja was still ahead.

"It is also essential to complete the investigations the government of Iraq has launched to address alleged abuses of civilians", Carter said.

The military's swift advance surprised many who anticipated a protracted battle for Falluja, a bastion of Sunni Muslim insurgency where some of the fiercest fighting of the U.S. occupation of Iraq took place in 2004 against Islamic State's forerunner, al Qaeda.