Iraq remains steadfast as Tikrit battle reportedly stalls
A stalemate in the battle for control of Tikrit, a strategic Sunni city once home to Saddam Hussein. Iraqi forces have been unable to seize more ground as ISIL fights to maintain its grip....
By: CCTV America
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Iraq remains steadfast as Tikrit battle reportedly stalls - Video
Sunni ExDefense Minister of Iraq "We Sabotaged The Army"
By: IraqEnglish
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Sunni ExDefense Minister of Iraq "We Sabotaged The Army" - Video
Where In The World Is Nelly? (Answer: Iraq)
When Nelly goes missing, where do you find him? Iraq--of course! The American rapper made a surprise visit to a semi-autonomous region Kurdistan in Northern Iraq Iraq, to meet with local officials...
By: Nirvana News
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Where In The World Is Nelly? (Answer: Iraq) - Video
Arbil, Iraq Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government said on Saturday it has evidence Islamic State used chlorine gas as a chemical weapon against Kurdish peshmerga forces.
The Kurdish region's Security Council said in a statement to Reuters that the peshmerga had taken soil and clothing samples after an Islamic State suicide bombing in northern Iraq in January. It said laboratory analysis showed "the samples contained levels of chlorine that suggested the substance was used in weaponised form."
Chlorine is a choking agent whose use as a chemical weapon dates back to World War One. It is banned under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention.
It was not possible to independently verify the Kurdish allegation.
The statement said the analysis was carried out in a European Union-certified laboratory after the soil and samples were sent by the Kurdish Regional Government to a "partner nation" in the U.S.-led coalition that is fighting Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria. A source in the Kurdish Security Council declined to identify the laboratory.
The Jan. 23 suicide car bombing took place on a highway between Mosul and the Syrian border where peshmerga forces were preparing defensive positions after a two-day offensive, the statement said.
The Kurdish source said that the peshmerga fired a rocket at the car carrying the bomb so there were no casualties from the incident, because it exploded before reaching its target.
The BBC also reported thatIraqi officials have video footage, which they say proves Islamic State militants are using chlorine gas in roadside bomb attacks.The videos show bomb disposal teams carrying out controlled explosions, which send plumes of orange smoke into the air.
There have been multiple reports that IS has been deploying chlorine gas since late last year, but Iraqi officials say their footage confirms its use.
"They have resorted to this new method," Haider Taher, from the Iraq Bomb Disposal Team,told the BBC. "They're putting chlorine inside these homemade roadside bombs, which is toxic for those that inhale it."
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Did ISIS use chlorine gas in Iraq attacks?
By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA and SAMEER N. YACOUB Associated Press
TIKRIT, Iraq (AP) - The U.S. has failed to live up to its promises to help Iraq fight Islamic State extremists, unlike the "unconditional" assistance being given by Iran, the commander of Iraq's powerful Shiite militias alleged Friday.
In a battlefield interview near Tikrit, where Iraqi forces are fighting to retake Saddam Hussein's hometown from the militants of the so-called Islamic State, commander Hadi al-Amiri criticized those who "kiss the hands of the Americans and get nothing in return."
Iraqi forces entered Tikrit for the first time Wednesday from the north and south. On Friday, they waged fierce battles to secure the northern neighborhood of Qadisiyya and lobbed mortar shells and rockets into the city center, still in the hands of IS militants. Iraqi military officials have said they expect to reach central Tikrit in two to three days.
The Iranian-backed Shiite militias have played a crucial role in regaining territory from the Sunni extremists of the Islamic State group, supporting Iraq's embattled military and police forces.
An Iraqi government official told The Associated Press that Iran has sold Baghdad nearly $10 billion in arms and hardware, mostly weapons for urban warfare like assault rifles, heavy machine-guns and rocket launchers. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.
In November, President Barack Obama authorized the deployment of up to 1,500 more U.S. troops to bolster Iraqi forces, which could more than double the total of American forces in Iraq to 3,100. The Pentagon has made a spending request to Congress of $1.6 billion, focusing on training and arming Kurdish and Iraqi forces. According to a Pentagon document prepared in November, the U.S. is looking to provide an estimated $89.3 million in weapons and equipment to each of the nine Iraqi brigades.
The U.S.-led coalition of eight countries has launched more than 2,000 airstrikes in Iraq alone since August 2014, and the U.S. is also hitting the militant group from the air in Syria. Iraqi and U.S. officials have acknowledged the role airstrikes have played in rolling back the militants, saying the air campaign was an essential component in victories at the Mosul Dam, in Amirli, and more recently, in the crucial oil refining town of Beiji.
But the U.S. is not taking part in the operation in Tikrit, with U.S. officials saying they were not asked by Iraq to participate.
Al-Amiri, the Shiite militia commander who also is head of the Badr Organization political party, said that "help from Iran is unconditional."
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Iraq's militia leader calls Iranian support 'unconditional'