Iraqi militia threatens Daesh's supply route to Syria

BAGHDAD — An Iraqi Shiite militia said on Wednesday it was on the verge of driving Daesh militants from an air base west of Mosul, a victory which would threaten the extremists' supply route from Syria to its last major stronghold in Iraq.

Some Daesh militants have already pulled out of the Tal Afar Base and moved to the town of the same name, said Jafaar Hussaini, a spokesman for Kata'ib Hizbollah, an Iranian-backed group.

"The battle will be finished today," he said.

Should Kata'ib Hizbollah succeed, it would be a significant development in the campaign to recapture Mosul, Daesh's de facto capital since its forces swept through Iraq in 2014 and set up a self-declared "caliphate" in a swathe of Syria and northern Iraq.

The base lies about 60km west of Mosul on the main road to Syria and its recapture would endanger Daesh's supply route for Mosul.

But the development could also alarm Turkey, which is wary of Shiite involvement in the civil war in Syria.

Kata'ib Hizbollah is a main component of the Popular Mobilisation, a coalition of mainly Shiite militias taking part in the battle for Mosul.
While the Shiite coalition is fighting Daesh west of Mosul, regular army and police units are trying to advance from the other sides, backed by Kurdish peshmerga fighters deployed in the north and the east.

Iraqi counter-terrorism forces breached Daesh defences in east Mosul two weeks ago but have faced resistance from the militants, who have fought back with suicide car bombs, snipers and waves of counter-attacks.

The campaign that began on October 17 with air and ground support from a US-led coalition is the biggest military operation in Iraq in more than a decade of turmoil unleashed by the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

Popular Mobilisation, known locally by its Arabic name Hashid Shaabi, has said it plans to use Tal Afar Base to take the battle against Daesh into Syria, fighting on the side of President Bashar Assad, an ally of Iran.

Although it officially reports to Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al Abadi, it is mainly trained and equipped by Iran.

Popular Mobilisation's advance towards Tal Afar, which had a mixed population of mainly Shiite and Sunni Turkmen before Daesh captured it in 2014, has raised the prospect of sectarian strife and alarmed neighbouring Turkey.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last month that Turkey was reinforcing its troops on the border with Iraq and would respond if the militias "cause terror" in Tal Afar.

Iraq's Abadi has sought to calm fears that the operation to recapture Tal Afar would ignite sectarian tension or escalate problems with Turkey, saying the attacking force that would enter the town will reflect its religious and ethnic make-up.
The Nineveh region surrounding Mosul is a mosaic of ethnic and religious communities — Arabs, Turkmen, Kurds, Yazidis, Christians, Sunnis, Shi'ites — though Sunni Arabs comprise the overwhelming majority.

The government forces have been fighting in a dozen of the roughly 60 neighbourhoods on the eastern part of Mosul, which is divided by the Tigris River

They have yet to enter from the northern and the southern sides.

Iraqi officials say the militants have used the city's more than one million remaining residents as human shields, firing from rooftops of inhabited houses and using a network of tunnels to launch ambushes in the midst of residential areas.

While the presence of civilians has slowed the advance, Iraqi officials say some of their operations have been assisted by information provided by residents about Daesh positions.

Trying to stop the flow of any information out of Mosul, the militants have cracked down on communications, banning the use of mobile phones and also confiscating satellite dishes to prevent people from seeing the progress made by Iraqi forces.

The group has also killed civilians suspected of helping the attacking forces, sometime putting their bodies on display around the city.

Iraqi military estimates put the number of Daesh militants in the city at 5,000 to 6,000. Facing them is a 100,000-strong coalition of Iraqi government forces, Kurdish fighters and Shiite paramilitary units.