Armed forces claim Iraq ’totally liberated’ from ISIS

The country’s Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi, also declared the “end of the war against Isis”, AFP reported.

Our forces are in complete control of the Iraqi-Syrian border and I therefore announce the end of the war against ISIS,” Abadi said.

In the announcement, Lt Gen Abdul-Amir Rasheed Yar Allah said combat operations against the extremists have concluded after Iraqi forces retook control of the country’s border with Syria 

The statement said: “All Iraqi lands are liberated from terrorist Daesh gangs and our forces completely control the international Iraqi-Syrian borders.”

Isis fighters overran nearly a third of Iraqi territory, including Mosul, the country’s second-largest city, in the summer of 2014. 

Over the past three-and-a-half years, Iraqi ground forces supported by the US-led coalition have retaken all the territory once held by extremists, but the group remains capable of carrying out insurgent attacks.

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