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After eight months of grinding urban warfare, Iraqi troops have captured the ruined mosque at the heart of Islamic State's (IS) de facto capital Mosul, and the Prime Minister has declared the group's self-styled caliphate at an end.
Key points:
- Analysts say Islamic State still occupies an area as a big as Belgium
- Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared a caliphate from Grand al-Nuri Mosque in 2014
- Much of mosque and brickwork minaret reduced to rubble
Iraqi authorities expect the long battle for Mosul to end in coming days as remaining Islamic State fighters are bottled up in just a handful of neighbourhoods of the Old City.
The seizure of the nearly 850-year-old Grand al-Nuri Mosque — from where Islamic State proclaimed the caliphate nearly three years ago to the day — is a huge symbolic victory.
"The return of al-Nuri Mosque and al-Hadba minaret to the fold of the nation marks the end of the Daesh state of falsehood," Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said in a statement, referring to the hardline Sunni Muslim group by an Arabic acronym.
The fall of Mosul would in effect mark the end of the Iraqi half of the IS caliphate, although the group still controls territory west and south of the city, ruling over hundreds of thousands of people.
Its stronghold in Syria, Raqqa, is also close to falling.
A US-backed Kurdish-led coalition besieging Raqqa on Thursday fully encircled it after closing the militants' last way out from the south, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.
These setbacks have reduced Islamic State's territory by 60 per cent from its peak two years ago and its revenue by 80 per cent, to just $21 million a month, said London-based financial services firm IHS Markit.
"Their fictitious state has fallen," an Iraqi military spokesman, Brigadier General Yahya Rasool, told state media.
IS still holds area as big as Belgium
However, it still occupies an area as big as Belgium, across Iraq and Syria, according to IHS Markit, an analytics firm.
Islamic State fighters blew up the medieval mosque and its famed leaning minaret a week ago as US-backed Iraqi forces started a push in its direction.
Their black flag had been flying from al-Hadba (The Hunchback) minaret since June 2014.
Much of the mosque and brickwork minaret was reduced to rubble, sources reported.
Only the stump of the Hunchback remained, and a green dome of the mosque supported by a few pillars which resisted the blast, they said.
The mosque grounds were off limits as the insurgents were suspected to have planted booby traps.
Mr Abadi "issued instructions to bring the battle to its conclusion", by capturing the remaining parts of the Old City, his office said.
In addition to military casualties, thousands of civilians are estimated to have been killed.
About 900,000 people — nearly half the pre-war population of the northern city — have fled, mostly taking refuge in camps or with relatives and friends, according to aid groups.
Those trapped in the city suffered hunger, deprivation and IS oppression as well as death or injury, and many buildings have been ruined.
'Lightning operation' to capture mosque
Counter Terrorism Service (CTS) troops captured the al-Nuri Mosque's ground in a "lightning operation" on Thursday, a commander of the US-trained elite units told state TV.
CTS units were now in control of the mosque area and the al-Hadba and Sirjkhana neighbourhoods and were still advancing, a military statement said.
Other government units, from the army and police, were closing in from other directions.
But the advance remains arduous as IS fighters are dug in the middle of civilians, using mortar fire, snipers, booby traps and suicide bombers to defend their last positions.
The military estimated up to 350 militants were still in the Old City last week but many had been killed since.
They were besieged in one square kilometre, making up less than 40 per cent of the Old City and less than 1 per cent of the total area of Mosul, the largest urban centre over which they held sway in both Iraq and Syria.
IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi proclaimed himself ruler of all Muslims from the Grand al-Nuri Mosque's pulpit on July 4, 2014, after the insurgents overran swathes of Iraq and Syria.
His speech from the mosque was the first time he revealed himself to the world and the footage broadcast then is to this day the only video recording of him as "caliph".
Reuters
Topics: unrest-conflict-and-war, terrorism, iraq
First posted