A third of east Mosul recaptured from IS: spokesman

Iraqi forces have recaptured more than a third of eastern Mosul four weeks into the battle to retake the city from the Islamic State group, the interior ministry's spokesperson said on Tuesday.

"More than a third of this (eastern) side has been liberated," Saad Maan said at a televised news conference.

Iraqi forces launched the massive operation to retake Mosul, the last IS-held Iraqi city, on 17 October, advancing towards it from the north, east and south.

Forces on the eastern front were the first to reach Mosul, and Iraq's elite Counter-Terrorism Service has since recaptured several areas inside the city.

On the southern front, interior ministry forces are approaching Mosul airport on the city's southern outskirts.

IS overran large areas north and west of Baghdad in 2014, but Iraqi forces backed by US-led airstrikes have since regained much of the territory lost to the extremists.

In addition to Mosul, IS holds the town of Tal Afar to its west, and also still controls areas in the western province of Anbar.

UN spokesperson Farhan Haq said on Monday that more than 54,000 people had fled their homes as a result of the Mosul operation.

He added that the number represented an increase of 6,600 people since 11 November.

About three quarters of the displaced people are being shelter in camps set up by the UN and its humanitarian partners and one quarter are been housed in host communities, Haq said.

He said the World Food Programme has provided food assistance to more than 100,000 people fleeing the conflict, including a distribution to 25,000 people on Sunday in Gogjali, the first neighborhood retaken inside Mosul.