SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Kurdish Peshmerga forces and the Iraqi force will hold another Islamic State uprooting operation said the spokesman of the Iraqi joint operations on Monday.
Spokesman to the joint operations between Erbil and Baghdad Tahsin Khafaji told the Iraqi media that the forces have launched the 5th phase of the ‘Strong will’ operation in the last week, adding the operation is set to continue for several months.
“The operations aim to drive out Islamic State terrorists in the areas between Iraqi and Peshmerga forces in Diyala and Tuz-Khurmatu borders, eastern of the country,” Khafaji said.
Khafaji stressed that at this moment trust has been built between the Kurdish and Iraqi forces to protect Iraq’s territory according to his words.
“Peshmerga and the Iraqi forces have put efforts for more than a year and carried out dozens of meetings so they reached to that stage which they have built trust for joint effort and sending a collective message to the terrorists for the sake of protecting Iraq’s territory,” He said.
“The Kurdistan Region and Iraq’s agreement on forming a joint coordination command is a healthy process and it would have good results” He added.
Earlier on Thursday, the Kurdish forces and Iraqi military launched the latest joint operation to eradicate the Islamic State terrorists, covering the remote areas in the Garmian region.
While Iraqi forces and Kurdish troops defeated the Islamic State terrorist group in 2017, but its members still roam in the disputed territories between the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and the Federal Government.
The remnants built a large number of hide-outs and dens in the disputed areas. They utilized the space to regroup and carry out partisan attacks inside the area’s security vacuum.
