Brother of Islamic State’s agriculture minister arrested while fleeing toward Kurdistan

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) An Islamic State leader, who used to work with the group’s alms department, has been arrested while trying to infiltrate through a border exit toward Kurdistan, a senior security source said on Friday.

In remarks to Baghdad Today website, the source said, “Iraqi federal troops managed to arrest Mohamed Khalaf al-Jabouri, a leader with Islamic State’s alms department, and brother of the group’s agriculture minister.”

The militant, according to the source, “was arrested at a checkpoint between Makhmur and Erbil.”

Jabouri “was hiding at Deibka camp in Nineveh,” the source, who preferred anonymity, said adding that he was arrested while trying to flee Makhmur.

“Jabouri confessed that his brother used to work as the group’s agriculture minister and that he was killed in an airstrike,” the source said.

Islamic State continues to launch sporadic attacks across Iraq against troops. Security reports indicate that the militant group still poses threat against stability in the country. The group still has dormant cells, through which it carries out attacks, across Iraq like it used to do before 2014.

Thousands of militants as well as Iraqi civilians were killed since the government campaign, backed by paramilitary troops and the coalition was launched in October 2016 to fight the militant group, which declared a self-styled “caliphate” from Mosul in June 2014.