Mosul in Pictures: How a city was destroyed by those fighting over it
The US-backed Iraqi army battle against Daesh has wrecked the nation's once-thriving city.
A displaced woman sits near the ruined Grand al Nuri Mosque in the Old City of Mosul, Iraq, July 1, 2017.
After nine months of intense fighting, Iraq's Prime Minister Haider al Abadi declared that Daesh's three-year occupation of Mosul had come to end last week.
But this victory verged on the pyrrhic. Much of the nation's second-largest city has now been destroyed.
Here's how the fight between Iraqi-allied forces and Daesh destroyed roads, streets and homes, and affected the lives of hundreds of thousands of people:
As Mosul residents welcomed the end of Daesh rule in the city, videos appeared online showing Shia-controlled government troops beating and executing alleged prisoners and Sunni civilians. This has sparked widespread criticism. "These horrific reports of mistreatment and murder have been met by silence from Baghdad, only further fostering the feeling of impunity among armed forces in Mosul," Human Rights Watch Iraq researcher Belkis Wille said.
Reports from the city showed that Abadi's declaration of victory over Daesh didn't mean that fighting in the city had ended entirely. Drone videos taken after the Iraqi army's declaration of victory suggested that battles were still ongoing, and at least 100 civilians still remain trapped.
During its three-year rule, Daesh forced civilians to move into conflict zones and used them as human shields. The group was reported to have prevented them from escaping to safety, as well as executing those trying to flee, according to the United Nations.
The Iraqi army operation in support of a US-led coalition to retake the city of Mosul, "Qadimun Ya Nainawa" (We Are Coming, Ninewa) also exacted a high cost on civilian lives. Pro-government forces' air strikes aimed at Daesh in Mosul took out Daesh members and also resulted in the deaths of hundreds of civilians.
According to Amnesty International, nine months of intense fighting forced 600,000 civilians out from their homes in west Mosul. Three million people are currently displaced due to the fighting in Iraq.
Iraqi forces first launched an offensive to retake Mosul on November 1, 2016 and managed to retake the eastern part of the city from Daesh in early 2017. The research group Airwars suggested that five times more civilians were reported killed in west Mosul than was the case in the east of the city.
Amnesty International says 5,805 civilians may have been killed between February 19 and June 19, 2017 as a result of attacks by Iraqi and US-led coalition forces.
Civil defence officials reported that as many as 4,000 bodies still remain unrecovered in the rubble in the city, where 80 percent of it is destroyed.
Locals in the city reported that corpses of people, all decomposed and some blindfolded or mutilated, were floating towards the west bank town of Qayyarah from the banks of the Tigris downstream from Mosul.
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