ARA News

Erbil, Kurdistan Region – Fierce clashes broke out Tuesday between militant fighters of the Islamic State (IS/ISIS) and the Peshmerga forces of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the castle of Hassan Beik in the Shingal (Sinjar) district west of the city of Mosul in northern Iraq, a source in the Ministry of the Peshmerga reported.

Major Saeed Zakouli said that the IS terrorists carried out offensive operations on Pershmerga locations in Hassan Beik Castle in central Sinjar, west of Mosul (400 km north of Baghdad) where heavy fighting took place between the two parties and resulting in the deaths of 45 IS terrorists, while 22 of the Peshmerga forces lost their lives.

“Additionally, four Peshmerga fighters were injured and transferred to hospitals in Duhok,” he added.

Alternatively, sources in Mosul told ARA News (on the condition of anonymity) that the IS-linked medical center in the city received the 13 burned bodies of militants who were killed during Monday battles in Kirkuk and Baiji, located in northern Iraq. 

The sources added that the IS militants went on alert Tuesday after receiving news of the death of Mullah Memnoon (aka Abu Nasr)– one of the group’s Emirs in Iraq, and the death of four prominent IS leaders whose convoy was targeted with an improvised explosive device in the Qayyarah district, southern Mosul.

“The group’s militants launched a campaign of arbitrary arrests in Mosul, and executed five people in the town center,” the source told ARA News.

Subsequent to fierce battles with the Iraqi army forces and the Shiite militia of the Popular Mobilization Forces last week, the IS group gained control over major parts of the strategic oil refinery of Baiji. Since then, the group has isolated more than 200 Iraqi soldiers in the refinery sub-district, local media sources reported.

Reporting by: Sarbaz Yousef

Source: ARA News