Suspected Daesh Bomb Attack Hits Northern Iraq, Terrorists Dead: Army

TEHRAN (IQNA) – Iraq's army said three suspected Daesh Takfiri terrorists died after blowing themselves up in northern Iraq but there were no casualties among government forces.

Army spokesman Yahya Rassoul said on Sunday that the incident occurred in a region near the Syrian border, where Daesh sleeper cells are believed to be present.

According to local officials, the suspects were killed as they were trying to attack troops in the village of Qayrawan, south of the mountainous region of Sinjar, which borders Syria, Press TV reported.

The incident took place a day after Syrian Kurds pronounced the death of Daesh's nearly five-year-old "caliphate" after flushing out die-hard terrorists from their very last bastion in eastern Syria.  

"Syrian Democratic Forces declare total elimination of so-called caliphate and 100 percent territorial defeat of ISIS," spokesman Mustefa Bali said in a statement on Saturday, using an alternate title for Daesh.

The Takfiri terrorist group unleashed a campaign of death and destruction in Iraq in 2014, overrunning vast areas of land in lightning attacks.

Iraqi army soldiers and allied fighters then launched operations to eliminate the terror outfit and retake lost territory.

Shortly after the beginning of the terror campaign in Iraq, senior cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued a fatwa calling on all Iraqi citizens to defend their country. Iraq finally declared the end of the anti-Daesh campaign in December 2017.

At Baghdad’s request, Iran also provided military advisory assistance to Iraq in the course of its anti-Daesh operations.