The Iraqi air force dropped leaflets on Friday urging residents in
the Islamic State-held Old City centre of Mosul to flee, raising fears
among humanitarian groups for the safety of desperate civilians there, Reuters reported.
The leaflet drop, announced in an Iraqi military statement, signalled
that the decisive offensive to dislodge the militants from their
remaining enclave in the northern Iraqi city was imminent.
The U.S.-backed offensive on Mosul, now in its eighth month, has
taken longer than planned as the militants are dug in among civilians,
fighting back with booby traps, suicide cars and motor-bikes, snipers
and mortar fire.
Civilians trapped behind Islamic State lines face a harrowing
situation with little food and water, no electricity and limited access
to hospitals.
"Iraqi air force planes dropped hundreds of thousands of leaflets a
short while ago on the non-liberated areas ... urging citizens to exit
through safe corridors," an Iraqi military statement said.
A resident in Farouq, an Old City neighbourhood, sounded desperate in
a telephone interview. "We're waiting for death at any moment, either
by bombing or starving," he said, asking not to be identified for his
safety. "Adults eat one meal a day, either flour or lentil soup."
The humanitarian group Oxfam said the leaflets suggested that the
Iraqi forces' move on the Old City in Mosul "is imminent ... This could
involve an official announcement from the military in the coming days".
"Save the Children is deeply concerned that any calls to leave west
Mosul will mean that civilians, particularly children, are in
significant danger of being caught in the crossfire," another aid
organisation said in a statement.
The militants have laid sheets of corrugated metal over pebbles in
the alleys as an early warning system, residents said. The grinding
noise produced by treading on it would alert them to any troop movements
or civilians trying to escape.
The United Nations last week said up to 200,000 more people could flee Mosul as fighting moves to the Old City.
Residents said millet, usually used as bird feed, is being baked like
rice as food prices increased by ten folds. People were seen collecting
wild mallow plants in abandoned lots and also eating mulberry leaves
and other types of plants.
About 700,000, about a third of the pre-war city's population, have
already fled, seeking refuge either with friends and relatives or in
camps.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had initially hoped Mosul would be retaken by the end of 2016.
The fall of Mosul would mark the end of Iraqi half of the "caliphate"
declared nearly three years ago by Islamic State leader Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi, which also covers parts of Syria.
Iraqi military commanders had expressed hope of taking control of the
Old City's Grand al-Nuri mosque, from which Baghdadi declared the
caliphate, before the fasting month of Ramadan, which starts on Saturday
or Sunday in Iraq.
The insurgency is expected to continue in the sparsely populated
desert region along the Syrian border even if Mosul is fully captured.
Iranian-backed Shi'ite paramilitary forces are fighting Islamic State
in that part of the country where Baghdadi is believed to be hiding,
according to U.S. and Iraqi officials.
The Iraqi Shi'ite paramilitary force, known as Popular Mobilisation, is theoretically under Abadi's command.
On Friday, it announced it had captured the Sinjar military base,
cutting the road between two cities that remain under Islamic State
control west of Mosul, Tal Afar and Baaj, and getting closer to the
Syrian border.
Iraq's Shi'ite-led government is aiming to control the border in
coordination with the Iranian-backed army of Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad.
