Hans Rustad Den mest ekstreme jihadistgruppen, ISIS eller ISIL, har gått til storangrep på Iraks tredje største by, Mosul, med én million innbyggere. Tusenvis av fanger er befridd og sikkerhetsstyrkene er drevet på flukt.
Al-Qaeda seized control of Iraq’s third biggest city on Tuesday, freeing thousands of comrades in a series of jailbreaks and sparking a mass exodus of refugees.
The assault on the city of Mosul, 225 miles north west of Baghdad, saw the Iraqi army retreat to the outskirts after a sustained assault by men armed with heavy machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.
As well as seizing the main governorate building – forcing the city’s governor to flee – the gunmen were also reported to have gained control of three different jails, numerous police stations and an airport, where several military planes and helicopters were based.
The loss of the city, home to around one million people, is potentially a huge challenge to the Iraqi government, which has been struggling to control a regalvanised al-Qaeda insurgency for more than two years now.
Terrified residents of Mosul spoke of seeing militants raising al-Qaeda’s black flag from buildings, and of newly-released prisoners running through the streets in yellow jumpsuits.
Situasjonen var uklar tirsdag. Det pågikk fortsatt skyting, men det avgjørende slaget ser ut til å være over. Regjeringsstyrkene trakk seg ut. Ifølge noen ble de pepret med stener av befolkningen.
En irakisk regjeringskilde bekrefter at de har mistet kontrollen over Mosul.
«The city of Mosul is outside the control of the state and at the mercy of the militants,» an interior ministry official told the Agence France Presse news agency, saying soldiers had fled after removing their uniforms.
Several residents told the Associated Press that the militants were now touring the city with loudspeakers, announcing that they had «come to liberate Mosul and would fight only those who attack them».
«The situation is chaotic inside the city and there is nobody to help us,» said Umm Karam, a government employee. «We are afraid… There is no police or army in Mosul.»
Hvis ISIS skulle lykkes å innta Mosul vil kunne skaffe seg kontroll over begge sider av grensen til Syria. De kontrollerer allerede byen Raqqa på syrisk side.
Angrepet er uansett et stort prestisjetap for regjeringen i Bagdad. Skulle den miste kontrollen over Mosul er konsekvensene nesten ukalkulerbare.
I desember mistet regjeringen kontroll over Fallujah og har ikke gjenvunnet byen.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/10888958/Al-Qaeda-seizes-Iraqs-third-largest-city-as-terrified-residents-flee.html
