Iraqi forces recaptured the strategic town of Baiji on Friday in a significant victory over the Islamic State (IS), as the UN accused the extremist group of crimes against humanity in neighboring Syria.
Baiji is the largest town to be retaken by Iraqi government troops since militants led by the group formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant overran much of the country’s Sunni Arab heartland in June, subsequently declaring an Islamic “caliphate” in Iraqi and Syrian territory.
The northern town, which had been out of Baghdad’s control for months, is located near Iraq’s largest oil refinery on the main highway to the IS-held second city of Mosul.
Its recapture further isolates the Sunni militants farther south in the city of Tikrit, hometown of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, although IS still controls large parts of Iraq and swathes of Syria.
“Iraqi forces were able to regain complete control of the town of Baiji,” Ahmed al-Krayim, the head of the Salaheddin Provincial Council, told reporters.
Soldiers, police, Shiite militiamen and tribesmen were all involved in the operation to retake Baiji, and are now pushing farther north, Krayim said.
“Iraqi forces are on their way to the Baiji refinery,” north of the town, where security forces have held out against repeated jihadist attacks, he said.
Breaking through to the massive refinery would be another significant win for the government in Baghdad.
The operation to retake Baiji began more than four weeks ago when security forces and pro-government fighters started advancing towards the town from the south, slowed by bombs militants had planted on the way, and finally entered on Oct. 31.
The nearby Baiji refinery once produced about 300,000 barrels of refined petroleum products per day, meeting 50 percent of the country’s needs, but it would take time before it could be brought back online.
The town’s recapture was marred by a suicide bombing on Friday that targeted a military command headquarters set up at Tikrit University, south of Baiji, killing at least four people, army officers said.
Baghdad was also hit by violence on Friday, when two car bombs killed at least 17 people and wounded at least 57, officials said.
Iraqi troops initially struggled to regain ground from IS after the start of the jihadist offensive.
However, helped by US-led air strikes, support from Shiite militias and Sunni tribesmen, assistance from international advisers, and a significant reshuffling of top officers, Baghdad’s forces have begun to make progress.
Washington has repeatedly said that it will not deploy “combat troops” to Iraq, though US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey said on Thursday that sending small teams of US troops into combat with local forces remained an option.
Washington has already announced plans to send up to 3,100 military personnel to Iraq to advise and train its forces and protect US facilities.
Dempsey also predicted that if the government in Baghdad fails to follow through on promises to bring the country’s Sunni Arab and Kurdish minorities back into the fold, “then the Iraqi security forces will not hold together.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi’s government has made progress on one of those fronts, reaching an initial agreement with the country’s autonomous Kurdish region to ease long-running disputes over finances and oil.
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