Iraqi forces recapture strategic Mosul-Tal Afar highway

By Sarhad Shakir

NINEVEH, Iraq (AA) - Iraqi forces have recaptured a strategic road linking the northern city of Mosul to Tal Afar, an Iraqi military source said Wednesday.

“Iraqi joint forces have established control over the road linking western Mosul to the besieged city of Tal Afar,” Musa Hasan Julaq, a leader of Iraq’s Hashd al-Shaabi forces, told Anadolu Agency.

Tal Afar lies roughly 80 kilometers to the west of Mosul.

According to Julaq, the road’s capture means that those parts of western Mosul still held by the Daesh terrorist group will now be entirely surrounded by the army.

In mid-February, Iraqi forces -- backed by a U.S.-led air coalition -- began fresh operations aimed at purging remaining Daesh terrorists from Mosul’s western districts.

The offensive comes as part of a wider operation launched last October to retake the entire city, which Daesh overran -- along vast swathes of territory in northern and western Iraq -- in mid-2014.