ERBIL
Close to 1,000 peshmerga troops have lost their lives fighting against ISIL in northern Iraq, a senior peshmerga official said Wednesday.
“At least 999 peshmerga troops lost their lives and 4,596 have been injured since June 10 when Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militants stormed the northern province of Mosul,” said Jabbar Yawar, secretary-general of the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs.
Yawar added that Kurdish Regional Government President Massoud Barzani planned to bring peshmerga forces representing the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) under one umbrella.
The plan, however, was delayed due to an economic crisis and the fight against ISIL.
Last summer, ISIL captured large swathes of land in Iraq and Syria, killing thousands in the process. It later declared the captured territories to be part of a self-styled "Islamic caliphate."
Since the group captured the northern Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014, a U.S.-led coalition has carried out numerous airstrikes against ISIL targets in both Iraq and Syria.
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