Officer killed, 3 soldiers seized in Iraq

An army officer was killed and three soldiers were captured in western Iraq after militants attacked their vehicle, security sources said today.

The attack took place late yesterday in the town of Akaz, five kilometres from the Qaim district of Anbar province. The unit was delivering food to other troops, the sources told Reuters.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack but Daesh militants are active in the area.

At least eight people were killed and 12 wounded in a suicide car-bomb attack on a security checkpoint in the same area last August.

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Iraq declared victory over Daesh in December, dislodging the group from all the territory it held after its self-proclaimed caliphate, which also encompassed part of Syria, collapsed earlier in 2017.

Security forces retook Qaim, which lies 300 kilometres west of Baghdad in the Sunni province of Anbar, on the border with Syria, in November. It was one of the last remaining territories in Iraq held by Daesh.

Since then, the group’s fighters have waged a campaign of killings and abductions.

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