Kurds: IS used chlorine gas

Associated Press

BAGHDAD

Kurdish authorities in Iraq said Saturday they have evidence that the Islamic State group used chlorine gas as a chemical weapon against peshmerga fighters, the latest purported atrocity carried out by the extremist organization now under attack in Tikrit.

The allegation by the Kurdistan Region Security Council, stemming from a Jan. 23 suicide truck-bomb attack in northern Iraq, did not immediately draw a reaction from the Islamic State group, which holds a third of Iraq and neighboring Syria in its self-declared caliphate. However, Iraqi officials and Kurds fighting in Syria have made similar allegations about the militants using the low-grade chemical weapons against them.

In a statement, the council said the purported chemical attack took place on a road between Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul, and the Syrian border, as peshmerga forces fought to seize a vital supply line used by the Sunni militants. It said its fighters later found “around 20 gas canisters” that had been loaded onto the truck involved in the attack.

Video provided by the council showed a truck racing down a road, white smoke pouring out of it as it came under heavy fire from peshmerga fighters. It later showed a white, billowing cloud after the truck exploded and the remnants of it scattered across a road.

An official with the Kurdish council told The Associated Press that dozens of peshmerga fighters were treated for “dizziness, nausea, vomiting and general weakness” after the attack. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to discuss the incident.

The Kurds say samples of clothing and soil from the site were analyzed by an unidentified lab in an unidentified coalition partner nation, which found chlorine traces.

There was no independent confirmation of the Kurds’ claim.

Meanwhile Saturday, Iraqi security forces engaged in fierce clashes with the militants as they continued their offensive to retake Saddam Hussein’s hometown, Tikrit.