Federal Police evacuate 14 families from western Mosul’s Zanjili

Iraq Federal Police forces evacuated Friday 14 Iraqi families from a western Mosul district where battles approach the birthplace of the Islamic State’s proclaimed “caliphate”.

Almaalomah website quoted a security source saying police evacuated 14 families from Zanjili, a district adjacent to the Old City, the place where IS supreme leader declared the establishment of the group’s rule in Iraq and Syria in 2014.

The families had been trapped for months under IS siege, said the source.

Last Wednesday, the army’s elite Counter-Terrorism Service evacuated 380 civilians from Zanjili.

Islamic State militants have faced accusations by Iraqi and United Nations officials, as well as local and world aid groups, of using civilians as human shields during the battle running in Mosul since October.

U.N. estimates put the number of civilians stranded at the battlefield in the Old City at 200.000, saying they suffer severe shortages in food and medicine.

According to news reports, IS had executed dozens of civilians in western Mosul for attempting to escape to security-held areas or acting as informants for the government troops. Dozens of other civilians were shot dead by snipers on their escape routes.

Iraqi government troops regained control over eastern Mosul in January after three months of fighting. Operations for the western side of the city launched in mid February, and Iraqi generals say a few hundreds of IS fighters remain in the Old City as a last refuge.


https://www.iraqinews.com/iraq-war/fe...osuls-zanjili/