(AhlulBayt News Agency) - British Defence Minister Michael Fallon said Saturday in Iraq that he expected to see the ISIS terrorist group expelled from the country's major towns by the end of 2017.
"We expect to see Daesh (ISIS) expelled from the major towns and cities of Iraq during the course of the year," he told reporters in Arbil, the capital of Iraq's northern autonomous region of Kurdistan.
Iraqi forces are nearly four months into a massive operation to retake nearby Mosul, which is the country's second city and where ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi proclaimed a "caliphate" in 2014.
The terrorist organisation then controlled around a third of Iraq, but federal and allied forces have since retaken around two thirds of that territory and Mosul is IS's last major stronghold.
After retaking the eastern side of Mosul last month, Iraqi forces are currently preparing to launch an assault on the part of the city that lies west of the Tigris River.
Commanders expect the battle to be fierce because the narrow streets of the Old City will complicate operations and the western side also harbours some traditional terrorist bastions.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said around the new year that he expected his forces would need three more months to rid the country of ISIS.
Most observers argued that the premier's prediction was optimistic, however, with Mosul alone threatening to bog down Iraqi forces way past that target.
Retaking the northern city would deal a death blow to the "caliphate" and any claim that ISIS is still running a "state", but the group retains control of several populated areas.
In Iraq, ISIS still holds Hawijah, a large town southeast of Mosul, and the town of Al-Qaim on the western border with Syria.
When Iraqi forces retake Mosul, the terrorists' last major hub will be the city of Raqa in neighbouring Syria.
"The situation in Syria is more complicated, given the continuation of the civil war there," Fallon said.
Fallon said the Royal Air Force had struck 300 targets in and around Mosul since the operation to retake the city began on October 17.
/257
12 February 2017 - 14:10
News ID: 811189
British Defence Minister Michael Fallon said Saturday in Iraq that he expected to see the ISIS terrorist group expelled from the country's major towns by the end of 2017.
