Baghdad, March 31 (IANS) Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Tuesday announced that security forces have freed Salahudin’s provincial capital city of Tikrit from Islamic State (IS) after days of heavy clashes with the radical group.
“The Iraqi forces have entered downtown Tikrit before a short time and have raised the Iraqi flag on its provincial government building,” Abadi said in a press conference in Baghdad.
“They are now clearing the rest of the city because Daash (IS militants) regrettably have booby-trapped the houses and buildings which they left in order to destroy all the installations,” Xinhua quoted Abadi as saying.
Abadi, who is also the commander-in-chief of Iraqi armed forces, said that Tikrit battles were “successful and will be repeated in other areas (seized by IS militants) due to the results on the ground, which minimised casualties among civilians and the security forces”.
A provincial security source said the troops backed by allied Shia and Sunni militias and covered by US-led coalition and Iraqi aircraft made a significant advance in southern, western and northern parts of the Tikrit, and later captured the downtown area after the IS militants fled the scene.
The troops pushed to the north on the western bank of the Tigris river inside the city and seized all presidential palaces of the former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
“Tikrit is under control of the Iraqi forces and the members of Hashid al-Shaabi, Popular Mobilisation, but sporadic clashes are under way as we are chasing the Daash (IS militants) in small pockets inside the city,” the source said.
The Iraqi security forces have started to defuse dozens of bombs and booby-trapped buildings in the city.
On Monday, the troops reportedly retook control of the main hospital building, which is part of the government compound, and took new positions in the surrounding area as they headed towards the central part of Tikrit.
Since March 2, some 30,000 Iraqi troops and thousands of allied Shia and Sunni militias have been involved in Iraq’s biggest offensive to recapture the northern part of Salahudin province, including Tikrit and other key towns and villages, from IS militants.
The battles to free Tikrit from IS militants were stalled for about two weeks as the militants planted thousands of bombs and booby-trapped dozens of buildings and cars.
Large parts of the province have been under IS control since June 2014, after bloody clashes broke out between Iraqi security forces and the group.