Militants from the self-styled Islamic State terrorist group have launched a dawn counter-attack, as Iraqi government troops push into the city of Fallujah.
A day after troops advanced through the southern suburb of Nuaimiya, scores of IS fighters attacked them, army officers told news agencies.
The army defeated the attackers but suffered casualties, the sources said.
Aid workers are increasingly concerned for the safety of 50,000 civilians said to be trapped in Fallujah. Reports speak of people starving to death and of being killed for refusing to fight for IS, BBC reported.
The Iraqi military has urged those remaining to either leave the city or stay indoors but IS is preventing civilians from fleeing.
Fallujah fell to IS in January 2014, a key moment in the militant group’s rise that saw it declare a caliphate across swathes of Iraq and Syria. It is one of two major cities held by IS in Iraq—the other being Mosul.
Lt Gen Abdelwahab al-Saadi, the overall commander of the Fallujah operation, told AFP around 100 IS fighters had taken part in the attack and 75 of them had been killed.
“They came at us heavily armed but did not use car bombs or suicide bombers,” he said.
But two officers with special forces in the area told AP that the militants had sent out six explosives-laden cars, none of which reached their targets.
IS also used snipers and tunnels in the attack, they added, speaking on condition of anonymity. Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, which helps families displaced from the city, warned on Tuesday that a “human catastrophe” was unfolding in Fallujah.
“Families are caught in the crossfire with no safe way out,” he said.
“Warring parties must guarantee civilians safe exit now, before it’s too late and more lives are lost.”
The situation of civilians in the city is dire, the BBC’s Jim Muir reports from Iraq.
They have lived through a nine-month siege with little food or medicine, and now they face mortal danger if there is an all-out assault on the city center, our correspondent says.
The IS fighters are being widely accused of using them as human shields, he adds.
