Iraqi forces liberate Ramadi from IS after weeklong battle

Monday’s recapture of the government complex is certainly likely to lift the morale of Iraqi forces, who were badly shaken by the city’s fall in May, which came despite months of U.S.-led airstrikes and advances against IS elsewhere in the country.

The army’s apparent capture of Ramadi, capital of Anbar province in the Euphrates River valley west of Baghdad, marks a milestone for the forces which crumbled when the hardline Sunni Muslim militants seized a third of Iraq in June 2014.

The joint operations spokesman Yahya Rasool said in a statement broadcast on state television that forces have achieved an “epic victory” in the city.

“While Ramadi is not yet fully secure and additional parts of the city still must be retaken, Iraq’s national flag now flies above the provincial government center and enemy forces have suffered a major defeat”, Kerry said.

“Daesh has planted more than 300 explosive devices on the roads and in the buildings of the government complex”, said Brigadier General Majid al-Fatlawi of the army’s 8th division. The spokesperson added that ISIS fighters still controlled 30 percent of Ramadi and the forces still do not control many districts from which the ISIS fighters have retreated at the current moment. Iraqi troops began advancing into some parts of the city, about 80 miles west of Baghdad, earlier this month.

One Iraqi official estimated that about 1,000 Islamic State militants were killed in the weeks leading up to Ramadi’s takeover.

IS had an estimated force of around 400 fighters to defend central Ramadi a week ago. “We are coming to liberate Mosul and it will be the fatal and final blow to Daesh”, he said in speech praising the army’s “victory” in Ramadi. Ramadi and nearby Fallujah, which is controlled by IS, saw some of the heaviest fighting of the eight-year USA intervention in Iraq.

Gen. Lloyd Austin III, the head of the U.S. Central Command, congratulated Iraqi forces on the “important operational achievement”.

Pockets of jihadists may remain but the Army said it no longer faced any resistance and that its main task was to defuse the countless bombs and traps ISIS left behind.

The battle for Ramadi was waged partly by Sunni tribesmen whom USA troops had trained to fight alongside the forces of the Shiite-dominated government. Mosul, northern Iraq’s main city, is by far the largest population centre in the self-proclaimed caliphate Islamic State rules in Iraq and Syria.

The strategic victory is a rare advancement of the Iraqi armed forces, which retreated in droves from much of the territory that Islamic State raided in 2014 and now controls in its sovereign borders.

“In Ramadi, these efforts will be led by the Iraqi government and coordinated on the ground by Anbar Governor Sohaib al-Rawi and his team”, he said, adding that the USA and members of the Coalition have pledged or contributed over $50 million to the UNDP stabilisation fund to support these efforts.