Iraqi forces fight fierce clashes in Mosul

Iraqi government forces fight heavy clashes in the northern city of Mosul to drive out the Islamic State (IS) militants from their last major stronghold in Iraq, the Iraqi military said.

In the second phase launched on Dec. 29 to push into the eastern side of the city, Iraqi federal police and army soldiers on Thursday continued their heavy fighting with slow progresses in Mosul's southeastern neighborhoods of al-Salam, Palestine, al-Shaimaa, Domiez and Sumer, a statement by the Iraqi Joint Operations Command said.

In the past two days, the troops recovered the nearby neighborhoods of al-Mithaq and Wahda after heavy clashes with IS group.

Thursday's fighting left dozens of IS militants killed and five of their vehicles destroyed, the statement said.

The latest battles in southeastern Mosul brought the troops closer to the center of the east side of the city, according to the statement.

In the eastern front, elite forces of Iraq's Counter-Terrorism Service (CTS) have cleared areas they recaptured earlier, including a vast industrial area on Tuesday.

Fighting including sporadic clashes continued Thursday on the northern front without a change in the front lines, killing two militants and seizing ten vehicles, it said.

The battles in Mosul came as the CTS commandos, army troops and federal police launched on Dec. 29 the second phase of a major offensive to free Mosul. The troops made their new push into several neighborhoods in the eastern side of Mosul, locally known as the left bank of the Tigris which bisects the city.

Last month, battles in Mosul had been slowed as extremist militants used locals as human shields, resorted to suicide car bombs and made mortar and sniper attacks in stiff resistance.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said in a recent report that the military operations in Mosul, have pushed some 132,000 civilians to flee their homes in the city and its adjacent districts since the beginning of military offensive in October to reclaim the IS largest stronghold in Iraq.

More than 1.5 million people were trapped in the city of roughly two million population previously. Cold winter worsened the conditions for the displaced people who suffered severe shortages of food and water, while camps and other emergency shelters reached maximum capacity.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Oct. 17 announced a major offensive to retake Mosul, the country's second largest city.

Since then, Iraqi security forces, backed by international coalition forces, have inched to the eastern fringes of Mosul and made progress on other routes around the city.

Mosul, some 400 km north of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, has been under IS control since June 2014, when Iraqi government forces abandoned their weapons and fled, enabling IS militants to take control of parts of Iraq's northern and western regions. Endit