BAGHDAD, Dec. 16 (Xinhua) -- Iraq's two oil wells, which were set ablaze earlier by militants of the extremist Islamic State (IS) group, were put out in northern Kirkuk province, said Iraqi Minister of Oil Ihsan Abdul-Jabbar Ismail on Wednesday.
The Iraqi oil companies have managed "to extinguish the fires in the two wells of Khubbaz oilfield in Kirkuk province at an unprecedented time," a ministry statement quoted Ismail as saying in a letter sent to Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi.
In his letter, Ismail praised the efforts of the employees of the Iraqi North Oil Company and the national oil companies that support extinguishing the oil wells, stressing that "this is the appropriate response to terrorism that targets the national oil wealth," according to the statement.
On December 9, a source from the North Oil Company told Xinhua that IS militants had planted two bombs in Khubbaz oilfield in the west of the namesake provincial capital Kirkuk, some 250 km north of Iraqi capital Baghdad, and blew them up causing huge fires in the two wells.
Iraq's oil installations and pipelines have been frequently attacked by extremist IS militants despite the improvement of the security situation in the country after the government declared the full defeat of IS group throughout the country late in 2017.
However, IS remnants have since melted in deserts and rugged areas, carrying out frequent guerilla attacks against security forces and civilians. Enditem
