Air-strikes aid Kurdish fighters

US aircraft pounded Iraqi positions near the northern town of Kalak yesterday, aiding Kurdish fighters as they seized territory from Saddam Hussein’s fleeing troops.

Iraqi positions on a ridge west of the Zab river came under relentless attack, sending troops running for cover or speeding away in cars. No anti-aircraft fire was heard.

The aerial bombardment rattled windows in Kalak, but people in town went about their business, shopping in the bazaar and working in the fields. Some sipped tea as they watched the air-strikes from their roofs.

Far fewer Iraqi troops were visible than in recent days, which could indicate that government forces were pulling back toward Mosul, the largest city in northern Iraq.

The air-strikes yesterday helped prepare the way for an advance by coalition troops and US-backed Kurdish militia fighters.

The United States sent more than 1,200 paratroopers into northern Iraq last week and has begun coordinating military activities with the Kurds, who have controlled an area known as the northern no-fly zone since the 1991 Gulf War.

Several thousand more US soldiers are expected soon, Hoshiar Zebari of the governing Kurdistan Democratic Party said yesterday, declaring that a northern offensive could be a “breakthrough” in the campaign to topple Saddam.

Some limited US ground operations have already begun, Zebari said.

“These are behind enemy lines and many, many operations are very sensitive,” he told reporters in Irbil, the administrative capital of the Kurdish region.

Over the weekend, Kurdish forces advanced southward toward Kirkuk, Iraq’s second most important oil centre, and Mosul. Both cities have come under heavy bombardment from US forces.

Elsewhere in the north, Kurdish guerrillas working with US special forces attacked extremists belonging to Ansar al-Islam, a militant group allegedly linked to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.