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US confirms Daesh second-in-command killed

August 24, 2015 at 1:54 pm

The White House on Friday confirmed reports that Daesh’s second-in-command had been killed in an airstrike on Tuesday in Iraq.

“[Fadhil Ahmad] Al-Hayali’s death will adversely impact Daesh operations, given that his influence spanned Daesh finance, media, operations and logistics,” National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said using another acronym for the group.

Price said Al-Hayali was killed in an attack on his car in Mosul on Tuesday.

According to the White House Al-Hayali was a “primary coordinator” for moving weapons, explosives, vehicles and people between Iraq and Syria. He was in charge of operations in Iraq and helped plan the group’s offensive in Mosul in June last year.

Meanwhile, Iraq’s official news agency reported that the Iraqi army and allied popular forces regained control of the main supply route for Daesh between Tikrit and Mosul.

The agency quoted the governor of Diyala province as saying: “We put in place a tight security plan to prevent the Daesh terrorist group infiltrating the province.”

A senior US military officer also revealed that preliminary tests show traces of the chemical agent sulphur mustard on mortars that Daesh militants used to attack Kurdish forces in Iraq.

US Brigadier General Kevin Killea, chief of staff for the military operations in Iraq and Syria, said the field testing is not conclusive, so final tests are underway to get the full make-up of the chemicals on the fragments.

Killea said that in addition to the attack which occurred on 11 August he was also aware of two other incidents that Daesh had used chemical weapons.

He did not clarify whether he had any previous tests supporting the allegations.

Killea told Pentagon reporters on Friday that Kurdish forces brought the mortar fragments to US forces for testing, raising questions about the authenticity of the evidence.