Costs of fake passports for IS militants reach US$5,000 in Tal Afar

Tal Afar (IraqiNews.com) The price of fake passports for Islamic State militants has reached up to US$5,000, in light of growing number of militants who escape Tal Afar town to neighboring countries through narrow alleyways, a local source was quoted saying.

“Prices of the fake passports, issued by smugglers who deal with Islamic State, have reached upt to US$5,000 for each,” the source told AlSumaria News on Tuesday, indicating growing demands on the passports in Tal Afar.

“Smugglers began to raise the amounts required for smuggling from Tal Afar to neighboring countries to US$4,000,” the source, who preferred anonymity, said adding that “IS leaders pay double the price to flee the anticipated battles against Iraqi troops, which seek liberating the town.”

News reports quoted sources in July as saying that smuggling of IS militants from regions in west of Nineveh and Kirkuk provinces to the Iraqi borders have surged reaching up to US$20,000.

On Monday, the Defense Ministry declared conclusion of arrangements ahead of military invasion of the town. An army official was quoted as saying that an army division was ordered to leave Mosul toward Tal Afar within preparations to retake the town.

Tal Afar is one of the important strongholds still held by IS in Nineveh since August 2014, when the militants occupied a third of Iraq to proclaim its self-styled “caliphate”.