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Plans for Iraqi-Kurdish force to free Nineveh


Gutted by fire- Church of the Virgin Mary, Mosul

Gutted by fire- Church of the Virgin Mary, Mosul

The Iraqi government has announced the creation of a joint Iraqi-Kurdish task force to start military operations aimed at freeing Mosul and Nineveh province, currently under the control of IS/Daish.

The plan was agreed during a summit meeting in Erbil attended by Itaqi and Kurdish government ministers. Iraqi media also reported that the US ambassador in Iraq, Stuart E Jones also took part. Iraqi Prime Minister Haydar al-Abadi pledged that Iraq will commit its army in the liberation of the province of Nineveh, as it did for the region of Tikrit, and has also asked the people of Nineveh to join in the military operations against the militias of the Islamic State in order to be able to allow civilians to return to their homes.

Most towns and villages in the Nineveh plains were predominantly Christian until last summer when IS/Daish militia arrived, forcing tens of thousands of Christians, Yazidis and other groups to flee between June and August.

Father Paolo Thabit Mekko, a priest from Mosul currently living in a refugee camp in Erbil alongside his parishioners, said he had heard about the plans, but he had no idea when the campaign to liberate Mosul and the Nineveh Plain would begin.

"We have to see if and how it will take account of Ramadan, the Muslim fasting month that begins after mid-June. Of course, many want to go back to their homes. Among the Christian refugees there are those who in the meantime have moved to Jordan or Lebanon. Only a few went to France, and some have also returned. It is not true that everyone wants to flee. Many dream of returning to their life as it was before."

Meanwhile on Friday, many sources reported that IS has carried out mass executions of Yazidi prisoners after separating them from women and children. The bodies were then piled in mass graves.

See also: ICN 3 May 2015 Cardinal condemns murder of Yazidis by jihadists www.indcatholicnews.com/news.php?viewStory=27344

Source: Fides/CCN

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