Iraqi fighters kill ten ISIL Takfiri terrorists in Salahuddin

Iraqi government forces, backed by Shia volunteer fighters, have battled members of the ISIL Takfiri militant group in the northern province of Salahuddin, and killed nearly a dozen of the extremists in the process.

Chairman of the Security Committee in Diyala Council, Sadiq al-Husseini, said on Thursday that ten ISIL terrorists were killed as Iraqi troopers carried out three separate operations in the violence-wracked Salahuddin Province, Iraq’s al-Sumaria satellite TV network reported.

Husseini added that a Saudi national was among the slain terrorists, noting that Iraqi forces also destroyed seven vehicles used by the militants.

Meanwhile, some 500 tribesmen from the town of Abu Sayda, located 90 kilometers (60 miles) north of the capital, Baghdad, have also joined Iraqi security forces and volunteer Shia fighters to battle ISIL in Saladuddin. The fighters reportedly hail from twenty different tribes.

In another development on Thursday, the ISIL Takfiri terrorists have abducted a tribal leader in Iraq’s northern province of Nineveh.

A local source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the tribal leader, identified as Sheikh Abdul-Karim Mohsen al-Mariri, was taken hostage after ISIL members stormed his house south of the province. The source added that the fate and whereabouts of the abductee remain unknown.

ISIL started its campaign of terror in Iraq in early June 2014. The heavily armed militants took control of Mosul before sweeping through parts of the country’s Sunni Arab heartland.

Iraqi soldiers, police units, Kurdish forces, Shia volunteers and Sunni tribesmen are engaged in battles with the terrorists to drive them back from some areas they have under control.