The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has reported that seven people are currently receiving treatment for exposure to chemical weapons, near the Iraqi city of Mosul. Five Iraqi children and two women were sent to a hospital east of Mosul, in Erbil. The Battle for Mosul has been ongoing since the summer of 2014, when Mosul fell to ISIL along with other sections of northern and western Iraq. Since this time, ISIL has been fighting back United States forces and the Iraqi military. This is the first report of chemical weapons having been used in Mosul.
In response to the incident, The ICRC director of operations for the Middle East, Robert Mardini has said, ” The use of chemical weapons is absolutely prohibited under International humanitarian law. ” The Red Cross has been unable to state which chemical agent was used or who might have launched the attack. Iraqi military have suggested that stock piles of mustard and chlorine gas were used. The symptoms of the seven-people treated were the result of consistent exposure to chemical weapons, and included blisters, irritation and vomiting.
Mosul is Iraq’s second largest city and has one of the most diverse populations in Iraq, consisting of Sunni Arabs, Assyrian Christians, Kurds, Yazidis, Turkmen and other minority groups. Before ISIL forces came, Mosul was the main industrial city in Northern Iraq and a major trade partner with Turkey and Syria. Previously, there were 1.5 million people living in the city. Since the violence, the United Nations refugee agency has estimated that 4,000 people a day have been fleeing the western half of Mosul. Iraq’s interior ministry has said that on 2nd March, 14,000 people had fled the city over the course of one day. Despite these figures, aid agencies still estimate that numbers will rise, as Mosul is a densely-populated area, and fighting may soon reach parts of West Mosul. The Iraqi military estimates that several thousand soldiers are in Mosul, along with a remaining civilian population of at least 750,000.
The consequences of the Battle for Mosul are devastating, regardless of who wins. ISIL has considered Mosul as its ‘cultural capital’ and as it has been losing more and more territory (ISIL now controls less than 10 percent of Iraq, previously having controlled 40 percent). Its fighters have become more dangerous and desperate because the loss of Mosul will end ISIL’s control of Iraq, it will also not prevent future conflict. At the moment although Turkish, Kurdish, Shia and Sunni militias are united in the fight against ISIL, these groups could resort to fighting one another, as Mosul would still be debatable territory. Even if the Iraqi military recaptures Mosul, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s government is still under political opposition and has been accused of corruption and ‘acts of terrorism, violence and armed conflict’ resulting in deaths of 6 878 civilians, stated in a 2016 report by the United Nations.
The Battle for Mosul is not just on the ground fighting, with Al Jazeera reporting that there has been an ‘intensity of coalition air strikes’ leading more civilians to leave their homes. With this mass displacement of people and now the use of internationally prohibited chemical weapons, aid organisations and governments must focus on resettling the Mosul civilian population. The future of Mosul is uncertain and the end of violence in the area is not in clear sight.
