Iraq's army is preparing to launch an assault to dislodge insurgents from the city of Tikrit, north of the capital Baghdad, Military Spokesman Major-General Qassim Atta said on Tuesday (July 8) during the daily briefing.
Backed by Shi'ite militias and volunteers, the military has been trying since June 28 to advance into Tikrit, near the late dictator Saddam Hussein's hometown in Salahuddin province, but is still clashing with militants on the southern outskirts.
The city is known to harbor loyalists of toppled dictator Saddam Hussein, some of them loyal to the Naqshbandi Army, a group led by Baathists and former army officers like Ezzat Ibrahim al-Douri, Saddam's feared deputy and lifelong confidante. Douri is also from the Tikrit area, and is the most senior of Saddam's aides still at large.
The fighting is taking a heavy toll. The United Nations said last week more than 2,400 Iraqis had been killed in June alone, making the month by far the deadliest since the height of sectarian warfare during the U.S. offensive in 2007.
Atta said that the troops are waiting for the go-ahead to start the assault and hoped to avoid inflicting heavy losses among civilians.
Atta said security forces had already secured key entrances and areas surrounding Tikrit.
The Iraqi army retook Saddam Hussein's home village last week, a symbolic and tactical victory in its push against Sunni insurgents that have seized swathes of the country.
Awja lies 8 km (5 miles) south of Tikrit, a city that remains in rebel hands since Islamic State, formerly the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), launched a lightning assault across northern Iraq last month.
Earlier, Iraq's acting speaker said the new parliament has brought forward the date of its next session to July 13, after a five-week delay announced on Monday was criticized by local lawmakers and the United States.
The first session of the parliament elected in April ended last week without agreement on the three key posts of prime minister, president and parliamentary speaker, with the country in crisis over the seizure of large parts of the north and west by Sunni Islamist insurgents.
"For the sake of the public interest and committing to the constitutional procedures and preserving the continuity of building democracy ... we decided to change the date (of the next session) to July 13," Mehdi al-Hafidh said in a statement.
"Any delay in this could jeopardize the security of Iraq and its democratic course and increase the suffering of the Iraqi people."
REUTERS