Iraqi military and security forces made progress in their clashes with the ISIL near Ramadi and Baiji, as the Interior Ministry announced preparations to regain control over the city of Mosul.
An Iraqi government security source said that federal police supported by Shia volunteers got near eastern Al-Baghdadi town, west of Ramadi, the capital of western Al-Anbar province where the armed terrorists' presence remains strong.
After the clashes, units loyal to Baghdad lowered the black ISIL flag and hoisted the Iraqi flag over the military checkpoint in Majid and the mobile phone tower in eastern Al-Baghdadi.
Spokesman for the Iraqi Defense Ministry also said that combat planes of the US-led international coalition repelled on Thursday two suicide car bomb attacks in Albu Faraj village, in northern Ramadi.
The ‘Takfiris’ (Wahabist terrorists) tried to check the advance of the military units but were bombed by the planes that were also backed in land operations in the residential complex of Al-Tameem, in southern Ramadi.
Meanwhile, a federal police commander said his troops had killed ten extremists and destroyed a tank and three water cannons while trying to expel them from Al-Siniya, after which they stormed the military base and occupied arsenals and a cement plant.
hr/rma/pgh/Ucl
PL-50/MNA