Baghdad, Aug 16 (IANS) At least 15 Sunni militants were killed in a US air strike near Iraq’s largest dam in Mosul, media reports said Saturday.
US fighter jets hit the Islamic State (IS) militants as part of a military operation to help the Kurdish forces to regain control of the Mosul dam from jihadis, who captured it earlier this month, Al Jazeera reported.
The capture of strategically located dam on the Tigris River earlier this month gave the IS militants control over the water and electricity supply in northern Iraq.
The IS, an Al Qaeda splinter group, has in recent months seized swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria and declared a Caliphate.
US President Barack Obama authorised air strikes on the group’s strongholds earlier this month as it swiftly pushed towards Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region and the national capital Baghdad.