- Title: Iraqi army capture village in southeast Mosul
- Date: 28th November 2016
- Summary: AL-QASR VILLAGE, SOUTHEAST MOSUL, IRAQ (NOVEMBER 28, 2016) (REUTERS) TANK FLYING SHI'ITE BANNER MOVING FORWARD HUMVEES DEPLOYED TO VILLAGE/ PLUMES OF SMOKE BILLOWING AT DISTANCE / AUDIO OF GUNFIRE IRAQI HUMVEES AND MILITARY VEHICLES DRIVING INTO VILLAGE / PLUME OF BLACK SMOKE BILLOWING AT DISTANCE AUDIO OF HEAVY GUNFIRE/ SMOKE BILLOWING MACHINE-GUN OF HUMVEE FIRING HELICOPTER FLYING OVER/ FIRING MACHINE-GUN MOUNTED ON TOP OF HUMVEE FLYING RED FLAG FIRING TANKS AND MILITARY VEHICLES DEPLOYED TO AREA TANK MOVING FORWARD TANK FIRING HELICOPTER FLYING ARMOURED VEHICLE FLYING SHI'ITE FLAG MOVING CRACKLE OF GUNFIRE AND MACHINE-GUN / PLUME OF BLACK SMOKE BILLOWING INTO SKY ARMOURED VEHICLE FLYING IRAQI FLAG DRIVING ALONG DIRT ROAD IRAQI MILITARY HUMVEES DRIVING ALONG ROAD MACHINE-GUN ON TOP OF HUMVEE FIRING AS DRIVING FORWARD PLUMES OF BLACK SMOKE COMING UP TO SKY MILITARY HUMVEE FLYING IRAQI FLAG DRIVING/ MACHINE-GUN ON TOP OF HUMVEE FIRING IRAQI OFFICER TALKING TO WALKIE-TALKIE MACHINE-GUN ON TOP OF HUMVEE FIRING (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) COLONEL, SADEQ RISSAN MUHANA, COMMANDER OF 37TH ARMOURED INFANTRY BRIGADE, 9TH ARMOURED DIVISION, SAYING: "We were able to breach the enemy's defences lines and we have fully liberated Al-Qasr area. A number of Daesh (Islamic State militants) was killed and others fled. This was due to the good planning by the commander of Nineveh Operations Command and the courage of our fighters." ARMY HUMVEE DRIVING INTO VILLAGE/ PLUME OF THICK BLACK SMOKE COMING UP / AUDIO OF GUNFIRE HUMVEE FIRING HUMVEES FLYING FLAG AND SHI'ITE BANNER / AUDIO GUNFIRE HUMVEE HELICOPTER FIRING HUMVEES FLYING IRAQI FLAGS
- Embargoed: 13th December 2016 19:44
- Keywords: Iraq Mosul Al-Qasr village army Islamic State IS offensive
- Location: AL-QASR VIILLAGE, SOUTHEAST OF MOSUL, IRAQ
- City: AL-QASR VIILLAGE, SOUTHEAST OF MOSUL, IRAQ
- Country: Iraq
- Topics: Conflicts/War/Peace,Military Conflicts
- Reuters ID: LVA0015AD1MBR
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text:The Iraqi army liberated on Monday (November 28) a village, southeast of the Islamic State-held city of Mosul, as the offensive to retake the jihadists' stronghold grinds on.
The battle to drive the fighters out is the biggest ground operation in Iraq since the U.S. invasion in 2003, and is likely to decide the fate of the self-proclaimed Islamic State caliphate that has defied the world for two years.
Tanks and armoured personnel carriers advanced from the desert on the village of Al-Qasr as helicopter gunships flew overhead firing streams of canon-fire. Dark plumes of smoke rose above the buildings as shells and machine gun-fire shook the ground.
Colonel Sadeq Rissan Muhanna, commander of the army's 9th Armoured Division's 37th Armoured Infantry Brigade, confirmed the village's capture after Islamic State defences were breached. He said a number of militants were killed while others are thought to have fled.
Some 100,000 Iraqi government troops, Kurdish security forces and mainly Shi'ite militiamen are participating in the assault on Mosul, with air and ground support from a U.S.-led international military coalition.
As the campaign enters a seventh week, troops have so far entered about a quarter of the city on its eastern outskirts, but are moving slowly to avoid civilian casualties and have yet to enter the half of the city on the west bank of the Tigris River.
More than a million people are still believed to live in parts of Mosul under the control of the fighters, who seized the largest city in northern Iraq as part of a lightning advance across a third of the country in 2014. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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