Iraqi army controls main roads out of Mosul, trapping Islamic State

Iraqi forces first retook Mosul airport and the sprawling Ghazlani military base next to it, but are still struggling to secure a strip of the city’s southwestern neighborhoods where dense clusters of houses and thousands of civilians are frustrating the fight.

The PMU is an umbrella group of militant organizations working with government forces to free ISIS-held areas of Nineveh province, including Mosul, the provincial capital. The use of chemical weapons against civilians in the context of armed struggle is a war crime under worldwide law. “They would love to be able to use chemical weapons against us, against the Iraqis as they move forward”, U.S. Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said in October.

Some 15,000 children have fled Iraq’s Mosul city over the previous week where fighting between the security forces and the Islamic State (IS) terror group is intensifying, the UN Children’s Fund (Unicef) announced.

An Iraqi federal police commando leader said at least six “Islamic State” (IS) militant suicide vehicle bombs had failed to deter Iraqi troops from advancing toward Mosul’s old western city center.

Iraqi forces retook the eastern side of the city, which is bisected by the Tigris River, in late January after 100 days of fighting.

A two-month-old baby is being treated in hospital for possible exposure to chemical weapons after an attack in Mosul thought to have been carried out by ISIS.

But the United Nations office said civilians in many neighborhoods of southern and western Mosul have no access to drinking water.

The IHS conflict monitor found late a year ago that Daesh had used chemical weapons at least 19 times around Mosul since it took the city in 2014.

Sniper fire is a significant danger in Maamun, said Kathy Bequary, the executive director of NYC Medics, a group providing emergency care from a mobile clinic.

It is not clear if he is in the besieged city, where he declared his Caliphate in 2014 after the ISIS seized territory covering much of eastern Syria and northern Iraq.