Unidentified gunmen shoot Kurdish Peshmerga fighter dead in Kirkuk
Peshmerga forces. File photo.
Kirkuk (IraqiNews.com) – Unidentified gunmen shot a Kurdish Peshmerga fighter dead Sunday in central Kirkuk, well-informed sources told Shafaq News website.
Ali Othman Saleh, 29, was on a visit to Kirkuk when two unknown assailants opened fire at him in Latif Awa neighborhood in central Kirkuk, the sources said.
Saleh was seriously injured and later died after he had been moved to a nearby hospital, the sources added.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack, but the Islamic State (IS) militant group, in most cases, is responsible for attacks targeting crowded areas, including markets, cafes and mosques across Iraq.
The Peshmerga are Kurdish fighters, who actively took part in the security campaigns launched to liberate Iraqi territories from militants of Islamic State. Iraq declared that collapse of IS last December.
Violence in the country has surged further with the emergence of Islamic State extremist militants who proclaimed an “Islamic Caliphate” in Iraq and Syria in 2014.
The surge in violence between armed groups and government forces has resulted in over five million internally displaced persons across Iraq and left more than 11 million in need of humanitarian assistance, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.