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Kurdish Forces Regain Control of Strategic Town in Northern Iraq

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Kurdish armed forces have retaken control of town Zumar in northern Iraq and pushed Islamic State (IS) militants out of several nearby villages, a Kurdish security official said Saturday.

MOSCOW, October 25 (RIA Novosti) - Kurdish armed forces have retaken control of town Zumar in northern Iraq and pushed Islamic State (IS) militants out of several nearby villages, a Kurdish security official said Saturday.

A source in the Kurdish intelligence told Reuters that Islamic State fighters had put up a fight as they were evicted by local Kurdish forces, who made considerable gains on Saturday morning.

Zumar lies some 60 kilometers (36 miles) northwest of Mosul, a city which is key to Iraq's oil and gas production.

It was reported earlier that US Air Force and its allies from the 60-member anti-IS coalition carried out new airstrikes against jihadist positions in Syria and Iraq.

The IS, a Sunni jihadi group, has been fighting the Syrian government since 2012. In June 2014, it launched an offensive in Iraq, seizing vast areas in both countries and announcing the establishment of an Islamic caliphate on the territories under its control.

This prompted a US-led air campaign against Islamic insurgents in August. Since then, Kurdish forces have regained some ground, though IS still controls swathes of land in northern Iraq and Syria.

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