Baghdad (Iraqinews.com) – A group of Islamic State militants executed on Monday six people, including two pro-government fighters, a few hours after kidnapping them in Mosul city.

“IS militants wearing Iraqi military uniforms set up a fake checkpoint on the road linking between Ein el-Azab village in Al-Shirqat district and al-Hadar Island in southern Mosul,” Captain Abdel Khaleq al-Eifan from the Iraqi rapid response forces told Turkey’s news agency Anadolu.

The IS terrorists managed to kidnap six people, including four workers and two members of Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Forces) after examining their IDs, Captain al-Eifan said.

The bodies of the six people were found at a desert area a few hours after the kidnapping, he said, adding that the victims were found shackled and shot in their heads and backs, meaning that they were executed by the IS militants.

Iraq declared victory over Islamic State in December with the help of a US-led alliance, having retaken all the territory captured by the extremists in 2014 and 2015.

Despite the group’s crushing defeat at its main havens across Iraq, Islamic State continues to launch sporadic attacks against troops with security reports warning that the militant group still poses a threat against stability in the country. </s> Those who have been executed included civilians who have refused to comply with the relocation orders and 190 former Iraqi Security Forces officers.

Islamic State group fighters slaughtered at least 232 people in and around Mosul this week as Iraqi troops advanced on the city, the U.N. rights office said Friday.

"Last Wednesday, 232 civilians were reportedly shot to death. Of these there were 190 former Iraqi Security Forces officers," rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva.

"These reports have been corroborated to the extent possible," she added, stressing that the number of people killed in recent days could be higher.

Ms. Shamdasani said the execution-style killings came as IS was pushing forward with its strategy of forcing people living near the northern Iraqi city into Mosul, the group's last bastion in Iraq.

The rights office has said the jihadists aim to use these people as "human shields" in the ensuing battle for Mosul against US-backed elite Iraqi troops.

"ISIL has been forcing tens of thousands of people from their homes in some districts around Mosul," Ms. Shamdasani said .

Those who have been executed included civilians who have refused to comply with the relocation orders and those who previously worked for the government security services. </s> Six ISIL terrorists were killed during security operations in northern Iraq, the Security Press Center said Wednesday.

A spokesperson for the center, Brigadier General Yahya Resul, said the ISIL members were killed by Iraqi security forces affiliated with the army and police during operations backed by the Iraqi Air Force in Saladin governorate's administrative center, Tikrit.

Tikrit is located northwest of the country's capital, Baghdad.

Although Baghdad says the territory was cleared of ISIL last December, sleeper cells of the terrorist organization sometimes carry out attacks.

ISIL overran vast swathes of northern and western Iraq in mid-2014. But its military presence was largely destroyed late last year following a nine-month campaign by the Iraqi army centered on the northern city of Mosul. </s> Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Six Islamic State members, including a woman, were arrested in operations in Nineveh province, the Iraqi Interior Ministry announced on Friday.

In a press release, the ministry said troops in Nineveh “arrested six Islamic State members, including a woman. All are wanted for by courts for trials.”

“Two of them were arrested in Abu Maria village in Tal Afar, while the rest were in several areas across Mosul,” the ministry added.

Last week, news reports quoted sources as saying that over 20 IS members were arrested in several security operations carried out in west of Mosul.

Thousands of Islamic State militants as well as Iraqi civilians were killed since the government campaign, backed by paramilitary troops and the coalition was launched in October 2016 to fight the militant group, which declared a self-styled “caliphate” from Mosul in June 2014.

Islamic State continues to launch sporadic attacks across Iraq against security troops. Security reports indicate that the militant group still poses threat against stability in the country.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi announced, in December, full liberation of Iraqi lands, declaring end of war against IS members. The war against IS has displaced at least five million people. </s> The 39 missing Indians, who were taken hostage by ISIL in the Iraqi city of Mosul, have been killed, India’s Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj said on Tuesday.

The minister told Rajya Sabha, the upper house of parliament, that the government got confirmation on Monday that the DNA of 38 missing Indians had matched with remains found in a mass grave.

The DNA of a 39th body matched only for 70 percent, the minister said.

The grave was found after Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) fighters were driven out of the Iraqi city.

“I have concrete proof that 39 Indians have been killed,” Swaraj said about the Indians who were abducted by ISIL in 2014. “We wanted to give the families closure,” she said.

The physical remains of the Indians will be brought by the government in a special aircraft, the minister told parliament.

One of the workers was able to escape the ISIL custody, the minister said.

India’s foreign ministry spokesperson had confirmed in June 2014 that 40 Indian workers of the Tariq Nur Al Huda company in Mosul were kidnapped when ISIL captured Mosul and large parts of Iraq.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared “total victory” over ISIL in July last year after nearly three years of war backed by the US-led coalition. </s> Video: As Iraqi forces press on in Mosul, Islamic State launches Kirkuk counterattack

Suspected Islamic State militants killed 18 people in Kirkuk on Friday, four days after Iraqi and Kurdish forces started an offensive to take back control of Mosul </s> 'Bodies of murdered Iraqis lay in streets' after ISIL shooting, an apparent bid to prevent civilians fleeing, UN says.

Fighters from the ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, also known as ISIS) group have killed more than 160 people in one day last week to prevent them from fleeing western Mosul, according to the United Nations.

The agency on Tuesday accused ISIL of carrying out the attack in the group's last stronghold, where a coalition of troops is working to flush out the fighters.

"The brutality of Daesh [ISIL] and other terrorist groups seemingly knows no bounds," said Zeid bin Ra'ad al-Hussein, the UN's human rights chief.

"Yesterday, my staff reported to me that bodies of murdered Iraqi men, women and children still lay on the streets of the al-Shira neighbourhood of western Mosul, after at least 163 people were shot and killed by Daesh to prevent them from fleeing."

Hussein made the comments in his opening address to the UN Human Rights Council.

His spokesman, Rupert Colville, told the AFP news agency that the killings were believed to have taken place on June 1.

In late May, Iraqi forces launched a broad assault on parts of Mosul, closing in on the remaining pockets of territory held by ISIL.

Aid groups had expressed their concerns over the safety of hundreds of thousands of civilians at risk of being caught in the crossfire.

On Monday, UNICEF warned that 100,000 children were still in ISIL-held areas, living under extremely dangerous conditions.

Peter Hawkins, UNICEF's representative in Iraq, said the agency is receiving "alarming reports" of civilians being killed, including children, with some caught in the crossfire while trying to flee.

Separately, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Monday that at least 26 bodies of "blindfolded and handcuffed" men were found in government-controlled areas and around the city since the operation started.

READ MORE: UN envoy: Liberation of Mosul from ISIL is 'imminent'

Local armed forces told foreign journalists that 15 men were extrajudicially killed by government forces who were holding them on suspicion of being affiliated with ISIL, the rights group said.

HRW said that in the remaining cases reported by local and international sources, the sites of the apparent executions - all in government-held territory - raise concerns about government responsibility for the killings.

Last month, Stephen O'Brien, the UN under-secretary for humanitarian affairs, said the organisation had "deep concern" for hundreds of thousands of civilians trapped behind ISIL lines.

"Although the UN is not present in the areas where fighting is occurring, we have received very disturbing reports of families being shut inside booby-trapped homes and of children being deliberately targeted by snipers," O'Brien said.

ISIL overran large areas north and west of Baghdad in 2014, but Iraqi forces backed by US-led air raids have since regained much of the territory they lost to the group.

Iraqi forces launched a major operation to retake Mosul in October last year, fighting their way to the city and retaking its eastern side before setting their sights on its smaller but more densely populated west.

The eastern half of Mosul was declared liberated in January and the push for the city's western section, separated from the east by the Tigris River, began the following month.

Almost 10,000 people fled from Mosul's northwest and the Old City every day last week, according to UN estimates.

More than 750,000 people have been displaced from the city since October. </s> The elusive chief of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS) group Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has appeared for the first time in five years in a propaganda video released by the armed group.

ISIL's Al Furqan media network published on Monday what it said was a video message from its leader, in which he said the group would seek revenge for the killing and imprisonment of its fighters.

It was unclear when the footage was filmed but al-Baghdadi referred in the past tense to the months-long fight for Baghouz, ISIL's final bastion in eastern Syria, that ended last month.

"The battle for Baghouz is over," said the ISIL leader with a bushy grey beard and an assault weapon close by, sitting cross-legged on a cushion and addressing three men whose faces had been blurred.

Wearing a black robe with a beige vest, al-Baghdadi gave an 18-minute address.

The SITE Intelligence group said he also discussed the bombings in Sri Lanka that killed more than 250 people on Easter Sunday in an audio recording after the video ends.

"Your brothers in Sri Lanka have healed the hearts of monotheists [ISIL members] with their suicide bombings, which shook the beds of the crusaders during Easter to avenge your

brothers in Baghouz," he said.

'More to come'

This was his first appearance in a video since delivering a sermon at the Great Mosque of al-Nuri, in Mosul, Iraq, in 2014. That speech marked the rise of the group and its self-declared "caliphate" in Iraq and Syria.

In January of the same year, ISIL took the Syrian city of Raqqa as its de-facto capital. By June, the group had also captured Iraq's second city of Mosul, with a population of two million people. It held both cities until 2017.

Grisly public executions were a regular occurrence in ISIL's former areas, including burning people alive and beheadings.

At its peak in January 2015, ISIL controlled an area across Syria and Iraq roughly equivalent to the size of the United Kingdom and had attracted 40,000 fighters to its cause.

With a $25m US bounty on his head, al-Baghdadi is the world's most wanted man. Despite numerous claims about his death in the past few years, his whereabouts remain a mystery.

"Our battle today is a war of attrition to harm the enemy, and they should know that jihad will continue until doomsday," al-Baghdadi said in the video.

The written script at the start of the video dated it to earlier in April. The authenticity and date of the recording could not be independently verified.

Al-Baghdadi has periodically issued audio statements. His last voice recording to supporters was released in August 2018 - eight months after Iraq announced it had defeated ISIL and US-backed forces closed in on the group in Syria.

In the video published on Monday, he insisted ISIL's operations against the West were part of a "long battle" and the group would "take revenge" for its members who had been killed.

"There will be more to come after this battle," said al-Baghdadi, apparently referring to the final fight in Baghouz.

The 'caliphate'

Over the years, several armed groups outside the Middle East, including in parts of Africa and Southeast Asia, have pledged allegiance to ISIL, claiming devastating attacks on both civilians and security personnel.

The United Nations in 2016 said at least 34 groups from around the world had pledged allegiance to the group.

Judit Neurink, journalist and author of The War of ISIS: On the Road to the Caliphate, said the video would send an important message to ISIL's fighters that al-Baghdadi was "still there" at the head of the group.

"ISIS want to show Sri Lanka was how 'we are going to be, we are going to be everywhere, no longer in Iraq and Syria, but all these different places where you have to watch out for us, all our people are going to attack in different places, the global jihad is a fact'," Neurink added.

Nader Hashemi from the University of Denver said al-Baghdadi is trying to capitalize on the Sri Lanka massacre to draw attention to ISIL's continued threat despite its defeat in the Middle East.

"This is also a huge embarrassment for Donald Trump's administration. Just a few weeks ago, Trump was claiming, 'mission accomplished' and 'the war is over'. This video clearly sends a message to the Americans - and Trump in particular - that the head of the organisation is very much alive," Hashemi told Al Jazeera. </s> Iraqi authorities on Thursday arrested four people suspected of having carried out a terrorist attack in Mosul following the city’s recapture last year from the ISIS terrorist group.

“Four wanted individuals were arrested and charged with blowing up a market in Mosul’s eastern Al-Muthanna district in June of last year, causing deaths and injuries,” Captain Jawad Mohamed al-Makhzoumi of the National Security Service (NSS) in Nineveh province (of which Mosul is regional capital) said.

“Initial confessions made by the defendants indicate that they are in fact the culprits and that they are Daesh members,” he added.

In a related development Thursday, Iraqi authorities found the dead body of an unidentified individual in Mosul’s western Mansour district.

“The body is that of a man who sustained gunshot wounds to his head, chest and abdomen,” NSS Captain Mustafa Khalil Ibrahimi said, noting that the body also appeared to bear signs of torture.

While no group has claimed responsibility for the man’s abduction, the Iraqi authorities typically blame such acts of violence on ISIS.

Late last year, officials in Baghdad declared that ISIS's military presence in Iraq had been all but destroyed.

It appears the notorious terrorist group, however, still maintains “sleeper cells” in several parts of the country, including the northern Nineveh province.

This article has been adapted from its original source.
ISIL kidnaps and executes six people in Mosul, Iraq.