ISIL militants kill 14 Iraqi soldiers

BAGHDAD - Reuters

AP photo

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants detonated a car bomb and then opened fire on Iraqi troops in the western province of Anbar on June 25, killing 14 soldiers, security sources said.

Iraqi government forces and their Shi'ite militia allies are hoping to recapture Anbar's provincial capital Ramadi, which was seized by the ultra-hardline Sunni insurgents last month. 

ISIL swept through northern Iraq last year and has since taken control of a third of the country, a major oil producer and OPEC member. It also holds large swathes of Syria. 

Twenty seven soldiers were also wounded in Thursday's attack in Anbar's Nadheem al-Taqseem region. 

In the town of Hit, west of Ramadi, artillery fire and rocket attacks targeted the local irrigation department, killing nine people and wounding 13. 

The presence of ISIL militants has fueled a sectarian civil war. 

Iraq's army relies on U.S.-led air strikes and a Shi'ite umbrella fighting group known as Hashd al-Shaabi, or popular mobilisation committee, in its bid to a slow the advance of ISIL. 

Kurdish fighters in the north are also seen as a critical force in the battle against the Sunni insurgents.