Islam Times - 200k civilians displaced since Mosul operation started: IOM

Islam Times - A high-profile NGO says more than 200,000 civilians have been displaced since the onset of the operation to liberate the northern Iraqi city of Mosul from Takfiri Daesh terrorists.

In a report released Sunday, the Geneva-based International Organization for Migration (IOM) said the total number of those displaced from Mosul since October 2016 has surpassed 206,000.

The Iraqi army, backed by allied popular fighters, launched the Mosul liberation battle in mid-October 2016, and managed to claw back the eastern half of the city some 100 days later in January.

Late last month, they began engaging the terrorists in the western side of Mosul, the Daesh terror group’s last urban stronghold in Iraq.

The IOM further said the number included 45,000, who have fled the western sector of Mosul since February to the sites set up for the displaced.

On March 3, the UN refugee agency reported that about 4,000 people are escaping Mosul’s embattled west on a daily basis.

As a strategy to hold onto Mosul, Daesh has been using civilians as human shields to slow Iraqi army advances.