IS terror group kill Iraq army chief with explosive bulldozer

Ahlul Bayt News Agency - Fighters from the self-proclaimed Islamic State terrorist group have ambushed an Iraqi army convoy with a bulldozer packed with explosives, killing the commander of the Iraqi 1st Division and three of his staff officers north of Fallujah.

The suicide bomber attacked the convoy of Humvees and then militants opened fire, killing Brigadier General Hassan Abbas Toufan, a colonel and two lieutenant colonels in the Nadhem al-Taqseem region, said a member of the division and an intelligence officer.

There was no initial count on the number of soldiers killed in the attack.

The attack represents a setback for the Iraqi army which is embroiled in a fierce battle to reconquer western Anbar province, which has been under the control of the extremist Islamic State group for the past year. Fighting has been focused on the provincial capital of Ramadi, where the government had been making slow progress.

Earlier, the army recaptured the important al-Houz bridge over the Euphrates in western Ramadi, which had served as a primary supply route for the militants.

The security situation in Ramadi sharply deteriorated after the IS group seized three villages around the city, forcing an estimated 100,000 to flee their homes. Many had just started to return in the past few days as Iraqi soldiers and police have been able to secure the centre of Ramadi and push the militants back from some areas of the city.

During the weekly Friday prayer, Iraq's most revered Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged the country's politicians to end all disputes in order to confront the political, economic and security challenges facing the country.

"It is important that the brothers (the politicians) should come out with final and drastic solutions for the problems," said Mr al-Sistani's representative during a sermon in the holy Shiite city of Karbala.





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