International Shia News Agency

60,000 Shia fighters protecting Iraqi capital from ISIL : Security body

SHAFAQNA – At least 60,000 Shia volunteer forces, known as members of the Popular Mobilization units, are protecting Iraq’s capital, Baghdad, an Iraqi security committee says.

The Security Committee of Baghdad Provincial Council released a statement on Tuesday, announcing that there is no security concern in the capital with the presence of the Popular Mobilization forces, Kurdish newspaper Rudaw reported.

At least 3,000 fighters belonging to the Iraqi Shia volunteer forces have been deployed to the western Iraqi province of Anbar to help other security forces fight the Takfiri ISIL terrorists, who have reportedly seized parts of the provincial capital city of Ramadi.

ISIL leader Ibrahim al-Samarrai aka Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has purportedly threatened the Iraqi cities of Baghdad and Karbala with new attacks.

ISIL in Ramadi

ISIL Takfiris have recently took over part of Ramadi. Popular Mobilization forces have been deployed to the city to fight the Takfiris.

The Shia volunteer forces, one of the volunteer groups who have joined the Iraqi army, were dispatched to Anbar after Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi called on them to join the fight to drive Takfiri militants out of Ramadi.

The Anbar Provincial Council released a statement late on Monday, saying that the fighters, who have come from Babil Province, are stationed “in the al-Habaniyah military base, located 30 km east of Ramadi,” online newspaper Iraqi News reported.

Meanwhile, the United Nations (UN) said on Monday that ISIL’s recent attacks on Ramadi have forced approximately 25,000 people to flee the city, adding that most people escaping from the Takfiri group’s militancy and brutalities are heading toward Baghdad.

Setting fellow extremists loose

ISIL has reportedly released as many as 400 militants, including high-ranking terrorist leaders, from a prison in Ramadi.

“All of the 400 prisoners were affiliated with” the ISII terrorist group, “including fighters and some dangerous leaders” who had been arrested by Iraqi security forces in Ramadi, Rudaw quoted a security source in Anbar as saying.

ISIL has been wreaking havoc in Iraq since June 2014.

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