KIRKUK, Kurdistan Region – The Kurdistan Region’s Peshmerga forces completed an operation Friday that pushed militants of the Islamic State group (ISIS) out of areas south of Kirkuk, military sources told Rudaw.
An area of approximately 150 square kilometers was recaptured from the militants as Peshmerga forces pushed back militants from 13 villages, the sources said.
Three peshmarga were killed and 21 wounded in the operation, including Muhammad Haji Mahmoud, a well-known Kurdish Peshmerga commander and leader of the Kurdish Socialist Party.
The Peshmerga have remained a bulwark against ISIS expansion in northern Iraq, ever since the militants attacked the Kurds in August last year, igniting a war in which some 1,200 Peshmerga have been killed, according to official figures.
