Turkish artillery has hit militant positions in the northern Iraqi city of Bashiqa near Mosul after Kurdish Peshmerga forces asked for support, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said in televised comments Sunday.
“They (Peshmerga) asked for help from our soldiers at Bashiqa base. We are providing support with artillery, tanks and howitzers, Yildirim told reporters in western Turkey.
At the base, Ankara says some 700 Turkish soldiers are training Iraqi fighters to help remove ISIS from the country.
Earlier, Kurdish fighters said they had taken Bashiqa from ISIS on Sunday as coalition forces pressed their offensive against the militants’ last stronghold in Iraq.
A US official said Masoud Barzani, President of the Iraqi Kurdish Region, had informed US Defense Secretary Ash Carter that the Kurds had succeeded in liberating Bashiqa from ISIS.
Kurdish peshmerga fighters told reporters at the scene they had entered Bashiqa, but journalists were not being allowed into the town.
As the Pentagon chief went into talks with Barzani, US officials said Kurdish peshmerga forces had almost reached their goals in the week-old offensive.
The battle plan is for the peshmerga forces to stop along a line at an average of 20 kilometers (12 miles) outside of the city of Mosul, ISIS’s last major stronghold in Iraq.
“They are pretty much there,” a US military official said Saturday when Carter was holding meetings in Baghdad.
Elite federal forces are then expected to take the lead and breach into the city proper, where more than a million civilians are still believed to be living.
[alarabiya.net/Reuters/AFP]
23/10/16
“They (Peshmerga) asked for help from our soldiers at Bashiqa base. We are providing support with artillery, tanks and howitzers, Yildirim told reporters in western Turkey.
At the base, Ankara says some 700 Turkish soldiers are training Iraqi fighters to help remove ISIS from the country.
Earlier, Kurdish fighters said they had taken Bashiqa from ISIS on Sunday as coalition forces pressed their offensive against the militants’ last stronghold in Iraq.
A US official said Masoud Barzani, President of the Iraqi Kurdish Region, had informed US Defense Secretary Ash Carter that the Kurds had succeeded in liberating Bashiqa from ISIS.
Kurdish peshmerga fighters told reporters at the scene they had entered Bashiqa, but journalists were not being allowed into the town.
As the Pentagon chief went into talks with Barzani, US officials said Kurdish peshmerga forces had almost reached their goals in the week-old offensive.
The battle plan is for the peshmerga forces to stop along a line at an average of 20 kilometers (12 miles) outside of the city of Mosul, ISIS’s last major stronghold in Iraq.
“They are pretty much there,” a US military official said Saturday when Carter was holding meetings in Baghdad.
Elite federal forces are then expected to take the lead and breach into the city proper, where more than a million civilians are still believed to be living.
[alarabiya.net/Reuters/AFP]
23/10/16
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