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BAGHDAD: Gunmen from the Daesh terrorist group attacked an army barracks in a mountainous area north of Baghdad early Friday, killing 11 soldiers in the group’s deadliest operation in the country this year.
The officials said the attack occurred in the Al Azim district, an open area north of Baqouba in Diyala province. Two officials who spoke to AFP said Daesh group terrorists broke into the barracks at 3am local time and shot dead the soldiers.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they weren’t authorised to issue official statements. An Iraqi military statement said the dead included an officer with the rank of lieutenant and 10 soldiers.
The officials said army reinforcements were sent to the village where Friday’s attack occurred, and security forces deployed in surrounding areas. More details were not immediately available.
“We affirm that the blood of the heroic martyrs will not be in vain and that the response by our heroic army units will be very harsh,’’ the Iraqi military statement said.
Diyala province governor Muthanna al-Tamimi confirmed the death toll, according to the Iraqi News Agency. However, he also hit out at the Iraqi army, alleging they were caught unprepared.
“The base is fortified. There is a thermal camera, night-vision goggles and a concrete watch-tower,” he said. “The terrorists exploited the cold and the negligence of the soldiers,” he alleged, adding that the attackers then escaped to the neighbouring province of Salaheddin.
In a further sign of its resilience, Daesh also on Friday attacked a prison in Syria, killing at least 18 Kurdish security forces and prison guards, while losing at least 16 of it own fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor.
The Daesh group was largely defeated in Iraq in 2017, and in Syria in 2019, although it remains active through sleeper cells in many areas. The terrorists still conduct operations, often targeting security forces, power stations and other infrastructure.
On December 3, at least nine Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters and three brothers were killed in attacks claimed by Daesh in the northern Iraqi village of Khidir Jija, just south of the Iraqi Kurdish capital Arbil.
