BAGHDAD, April 25 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi security forces on Thursday killed six Islamic State (IS) militants in an operation at a rugged area in the northern province of Kirkuk, the Iraqi military said.
A joint force from the Iraqi army and Counter Terrorism Service (CTS), backed by Iraqi and international aircraft carried out an operation to hunt down the extremist IS militants in al-Shai Valley in south of the city of Kirkuk, some 250 km north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, the media office of the Iraqi Joint Operations Command (JOC) said in a statement.
"The operation resulted in the killing of six IS militants and the destruction of a warehouse and eight of IS hideouts, in addition to destroying a tunnel used by the extremist militants at a village in the area," the statement quoted Saad Harbiya, a JOC commander, as saying.
The troops also found some caves used by IS militants, while conducting an airdrop on an IS hideout in the area and destroyed it, Harbiya added.
The security situation in Iraq was dramatically improved after Iraqi security forces fully defeated the extremist IS militants across the country late in 2017.
IS remnants, however, have since melted in urban areas or resorted to deserts and rugged areas as safe havens, carrying out frequent guerilla attacks against security forces and civilians.
