Shi'ite militias to join Mosul campaign
soon
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[October 28, 2016]
By Saif Hameed and Maher Chmaytelli
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi Shi'ite militias
said on Friday they would launch an offensive against Islamic State west
of Mosul imminently, a move which would block any retreat by the Sunni
jihadists into Syria but is likely to alarm Iraq's northern neighbor
Turkey.
A spokesman for the Iranian-backed paramilitary groups said the advance
toward the Islamic State-held town of Tal Afar, about 55 km (35 miles)
west of Mosul, would start within "a few days or hours".
If successful, the offensive would leave Islamic State fighters - and
the 1.5 million civilians still living in Mosul - encircled by an
advancing coalition of forces which seeks to crush the hardline Sunni
militants in their Iraq stronghold.
Iraqi soldiers and security forces and Kurdish peshmerga fighters,
backed by U.S.-led air strikes and support on the ground, already
control Mosul's southern, eastern and northern flanks, and have advanced
on those fronts for nearly two weeks.
They have recaptured scores of villages on the flat plains east of Mosul
and along the Tigris river to the south, but the battle for Mosul
itself, Iraq's second largest city, could be the most complex military
operation in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion to topple former president
Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Adding to the challenges facing the advancing forces, retreating Islamic
State fighters have forced women and children from outlying villages to
march alongside them as human shields as they withdraw into the city,
according to villagers who spoke to Reuters by telephone from Mosul.
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Older boys and men of fighting age were taken off to an unknown fate,
they said.
The United Nations said on Friday Islamic State had abducted 8,000
families from around Mosul to use as human shields. A spokeswoman also
said they had killed 232 people near Mosul on Wednesday who refused to
comply with orders.
CUTTING LINES TO SYRIA
Ahmed al-Asadi, a spokesman for the Shi'ite forces known collectively as
the Hashid Shaabi, or Popular Mobilisation, said the operation to cut
off Mosul's western approaches was crucial to the battle against Islamic
State, also known as Daesh.
"This is the most important and dangerous line because it connects Mosul
to Raqqa and is the only supply line for Daesh," he told Iraqi state
television.
Raqqa is Islamic State's bastion in Syria, and the two cities form the
symbolic capitals of a cross-border "caliphate" declared by its leader
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi from the pulpit of a Mosul mosque in August 2014.
Iraqi and military sources say there has been a debate about whether or
not to close off the western route in and out of Mosul. Leaving it open
would offer Islamic State fighters a chance to retreat, potentially
sparing civilians inside the city who might otherwise be trapped in a
bloody fight to the finish.
Some civilians fleeing Mosul have used the roads to the west to escape
to Qamishli, in Kurdish-controlled northern Syria.
Just as the advancing army and peshmerga forces have had to battle to
recapture even small villages on the road to Mosul, facing waves of
roadside bombings, sniper fire and suicide car bombs, Asadi suggested
the advance on Tal Afar may take time.
It will be launched from the Qayyara military base, about 90 km (55
miles) to the southeast.
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![](../images/102816pics/news_p27.jpg)
A man walks with ships near Qayyara, south of Mosul, Iraq October
27, 2016. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic
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"Tal Afar is the final destination ... it is the pyramid’s peak. But
there are villages in the way that need to be liberated before
reaching Tal Afar," Asadi said.
TURKISH WARNING
The Tal Afar offensive will target an area which is close to Turkey
and home to a sizeable population of ethnic Turkmen, with historic
cultural ties to Turkey.
Turkey fears the use of the Shi'ite militias in the Mosul campaign
will lead to sectarian strife in the mainly Sunni region and
exacerbate an expected exodus of refugees.
Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said this week his
country, which has troops deployed north of Mosul inside Iraqi
territory, will take measures if there is an attack on Tal Afar.
The population of Tal Afar was mix of Sunni and Shi'ite ethnic
Turkmen until Shi'ites fled the town after Islamic State's takeover
two years ago.
Earlier announcements by the Shi'ite militias that they will be
involved in the offensive on Mosul, Islamic State's last major
stronghold in Iraq, triggered warnings from human rights groups of
sectarian violence in the mainly Sunni province.
Shi'ites make up a majority in Iraq but Sunnis are predominant in
the north and the west.
The Popular Mobilisation forces, formed in 2014 to help halt Islamic
State's sweep through Iraq's northern and western provinces, are
backed by Iran although they officially report to the Shi'ite-led
government of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.
Amnesty International says that in previous campaigns, the Shi'ite
militias have committed "serious human rights violations, including
war crimes" against civilians fleeing Islamic State-held territory.
The U.N in July said it had a list of more than 640 Sunni Muslim men
and boys reportedly abducted by a Shi'ite militia in Falluja, west
of Baghdad, and about 50 others who were summarily executed or
tortured to death.
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The government and the Popular Mobilisation forces say a limited
number of violations had occurred and were investigated, but they
deny abuses were widespread and systematic.
(Writing by Dominic Evans; Additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay
in Geneva; Editing by Giles Elgood)
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