BAGHDAD Government forces expect to dislodge Islamic State militants from the western Iraqi city of Ramadi within days, state TV said on Wednesday, citing army chief of staff Lt. General Othman al-Ghanemi.
If Ramadi is captured, it will be the second major city after Tikrit to be retaken from Islamic State in Iraq. It would provide a major psychological boost to Iraqi security forces after the militant group seized a third of Iraq, a major OPEC oil producer and U.S ally, last year."In the coming days will be announced the good news of the complete liberation of Ramadi," Iraqia TV cited the officer as saying. Iraq's armed forces began advancing on Tuesday on the last district held by the militants in the center of Ramadi, a Sunni Muslim city on the river Euphrates some 100 km (60 miles) west of Baghdad that they captured in May.
Progress has been slow because the government wants to rely entirely on its own troops and not use Shi'ite militias in order to avoid rights abuses such as occurred after the recapture of the city of Tikrit from the militants in April.
Islamic State also controls Mosul, Iraq's second largest city, and Falluja, which lies between Ramadi and Baghdad, as well as large areas of Syria - the core of what it has declared to be a caliphate.
(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; editing by Ralph Boulton)
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