For 1st time, Canadian forces clash with ISIL in Iraq

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Canadian special forces exchanged gunfire with Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant fighters in Iraq in recent days, in the first confirmed ground battle between Western troops and Isil, a senior officer said on Tuesday.

“My troops had completed a planning session with senior Iraqi leaders several kilometres behind the front lines,” Brigadier General Michael Rouleau, Canadian special forces commander, said.

“When they moved forward to confirm the planning at the front lines in order to visualise what they had discussed over a map, they came under immediate and effective mortar and machine gunfire.”

The general said the Canadians used sniper fire to “neutralise both threats” and there were no Canadian injuries.

He said the clash had taken place in the previous seven days and was “the first time we’ve taken fire and returned fire” in Iraq.

The United States has previously reported having launched an unsuccessful hostage-rescue operation against the ISIL group in Syria, but Western forces have not officially engaged in ground combat.

Canada has some 600 troops in the region participating in airstrikes against the ISIL. About 60 of them are special forces training and advising Iraqi troops on the ground but theoretically not in combat. /End/