Major IS attack on Mosul repelled, 63 militants killed

A day after the Islamic State killed at least 93 people in four separate suicide bombings in Iraq, the security forces repelled a major attack near Mosul on Thursday, leaving over 60 IS militants dead, an official said.

Two soldiers were also injured in the fighting, a military spokesman told Xinhua news agency.

The IS attack began at dawn when dozens of IS militants, including several wearing explosive vests, advanced from several directions toward the positions of the security forces and allied paramilitary Sunni tribal units in villages west of Makhmour, a town 50 km southeast of Mosul, the official said.

The troops, backed by US-led coalition aircraft and artillery, killed 63 IS militants and also destroyed four suicide car bombs.

Thursday's IS attack near Mosul came as the extremist militant group carried out two more attacks, which involved five suicide bombers, on security forces in Baghdad's western suburb of Abu Ghraib and in Albu Eitha area, just north of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq's western province of Anbar.

Both attacks were repelled by government troops.

Of the four suicide blasts on Wednesday, the deadliest was in Baghdad's Sadr city, killing 63 people and injuring more than 100 others.

--IANS

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