The Iraqi air force on Sunday claimed it had hit the convoy of Islamic State group leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in an airstrike in the western Anbar Province, close to the Syrian border. The condition of the militant leader was unknown.
"The Iraqi air force carried out a heroic operation targeting the convoy of the criminal terrorist Baghdadi," Iraq's security forces said in a statement, without clarifying when the attack took place, AFP reported.
“[The] fate of murderer Baghdadi is unknown and he was carried away by a vehicle. His health condition is still unclear,” it said. The military said the air force bombed the convoy as it moved toward Karabla, barely five kilometers from the border with Syria, where Baghdadi was planning to meet IS group commanders.
“The location of the meeting was also bombed and many of the group’s leaders were killed and wounded,” the military said.
The IS group has seized swathes of Syria and Iraq and in June declared a caliphate over territory it controls. Baghdadi said he had accepted oaths of allegiance from supporters in Libya, Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Algeria.
