Two Kurdish security forces injured by IED planted under ISIS flag in Said Sadiq

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Two Kurdish security force members were injured when an improvised explosive device (IED) planted under a flag of the Islamic State (ISIS) group exploded on Saturday, officials and eyewitnesses in the eastern Sulaimani province district of Said Sadiq confirmed to Rudaw.

The IED explosion occurred on a hill in the Said Sadiq district between the villages of Kani Spika and Bardarash.

The two Asayesh members injured were Sarkhel Sarawi and 47-year-old Atta Qadir, a senior official in Said Sadiq told Rudaw.

Said Sadiq mayor Diyari Rafiq told Rudaw English he had been notified by local  residents of the mine’s presence at 10 am.

“This is new for us and no one was expecting this… this can’t happen somewhere so close to the city,” Rafiq said. “The security of the people is a red line”.

Ismail Ibrahim, a 22-year-old from Bardarash, was out with a group of friends at the spot they frequently head to for picnics when they spotted the flag on the hill.

A few of them walked up to the flag and debated removing it, Ibrahim told Rudaw English, but decided against it. The friends rang the Asayesh, who advised them “not to go near it”.

“We saw Asayesh guys arrive… then we spotted blue smoke,” Ibrahim said.

In footage taken by Asayesh member Sarawi, Qadir can be seen removing the soil around the flag before the planted IED explodes.

ISIS took control of large parts of Iraq in 2014. Although the Iraqi government announced the territorial defeat of ISIS in December 2017, remnants of the group have returned to earlier insurgency tactics, ambushing security forces, kidnapping and executing suspected informants, extorting money from vulnerable rural populations, and IED attacks.

Remnants of the Islamic State in Iraq are most active in the northern provinces of Nineveh, Salahaddin and Diyala, as well as the western province of Anbar.

On Thursday, ISIS claimed in its weekly propaganda newspaper al-Naba that it had killed and injured at least seven people in Iraq in the previous week.

Updated at 9:10 pm

With reporting by Khazan Jangiz