The landmark Grand al-Nuri Mosque of Mosul and its leaning minaret have been blown up, with the Iraqi army blaming ISIL for its destruction and the armed group accusing a US-led coalition air raid. In recent days Iraqi forces have pushed deeper into the last remaining areas held by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group in the centre of Iraq's second-largest city. […]
At least two people have died and hundreds more have fallen ill after suffering food poisoning in a camp for displaced Iraqis east of Mosul, officials said. People started vomiting and some fainted after eating the fast-breaking iftar meal on Monday, lawmaker Zahed Khatoun, a member of the Iraqi parliament's committee for displaced people told Reuters news agency on Tuesday. Iraq's health minister told The Associated Press that a girl […]
The days of the so-called Daesh caliphate in Iraq are numbered” and discussions on how to rebuild the country have begun, reported Jan Kubis, head of the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI). In a briefing to the UN Security Council, Kubis announced that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres recently received the long-awaited submission of the Iraqi Forces Coalition’s vision of a national settlement. Kubis briefed the Security Council yesterday by […]
A car bomb blast killed at least 23 people and wounded more than 45 others in a mainly Shiite district in southern Baghdad on Monday, police and medical sources said. The explosion occurred on a busy commercial street , the sources said. The blast happened at around 7:00 pm (1600 GMT) in the busy business district of in the Amil neighbourhood west of the city, sources said. There was no […]
At least five protesters and two policeman have been killed in the Iraqi capital during a rally by thousands calling for an overhaul of the electoral system, according to police. Iraqi security forces fired tear gas and rubber-coated bullets at thousands of supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr, an influential Shia leader, who were demonstrating on Saturday near Baghdad's Green Zone to press for electoral changes. At least 320 protesters and seven […]
Iraqi troops backed by US-led air strikes have pushed deeper into eastern Mosul after a two-week lull in the operation to retake the city held by the Islamic State of Iraq and the levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group. Staff Lieutenant-General Abdulghani al-Assadi, a senior officer in Iraq's counterterrorism service, said the second phase of the operation, now in its third month, began on Thursday. He told the AFP […]
Iraqi army and the Shia-dominated Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) have suffered heavy losses during the Daesh-led offensive raids in the vicinity of Al-Salam Hospital, Daesh revealed in a video published on its official website. AlkhaleejOnline reported that the video, which was originally published by Daesh’s Amaq news agency, showed that dozens of cars and armoured vehicles were destroyed, some of which belonged to Iraqi forces and the others belonged to […]
Turkish jets hit 15 "targets" in the al-Bab area of northern Syria on Sunday in an operation with Syrian rebels that could foreshadow a push on ISIL's de facto capital Raqqa, the Turkish military said. Ten defensive positions, command centres and an ammunition store used by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group were destroyed in the raids, the army said in a statement. Nine Syrian rebels […]
Iraq's prime minister has warned Turkey against provoking a confrontation while saying he does not want war. Haider al-Abadi made the comments after Turkey deployed tanks and artillery near the Iraqi border and insisted that any Turkish involvement would be a violation of national soverreignty. Turkey wants a a role in the battle to retake Mosul from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group, by virtue of […]
VOC became the first Muslim radio station in South Africa when a special events license was granted to the station in Ramadan/January 1995. Subsequent temporary broadcast licenses were granted, permitting the station to broadcast for 24 hours.
