IS attacks base where US advisers stationed in Iraq

Islamic State militants launched multiple suicide attacks against a Peshmerga base north of Baghdad, where US advisers are stationed, killing at least two people, Reuters reported on Sunday. 

Five militants disguised in military uniforms carried out the attack at dawn on Sunday on the K1 base outside the northern city of Kirkuk.

Two militants detonating their explosive vests at the entrance while three others were killed in an exchange of gunfire.

"They were wearing uniforms like the Kurdish Peshmerga and had shaved their beards to look like us," an officer told Reuters.

A major general in the Peshmerga told AFP "two members of the Peshmerga were killed and five wounded in a suicide attack on K1 base."

The attack comes as advance of the US-backed government forces has slowed in nearby Mosul city mainly in the densely-populated old part.

IS has been trying to defend Mosul, its last major stronghold in the country, against a massive six-month-old offensive.

It had already lost most of it and its last fighters are mostly holed up in the Old City, preparing for a bloody last stand.

The jihadi group, whose self-proclaimed "caliphate" is disintegrating, has carried out a number of diversionary attacks on other fronts in recent months but failed to regain the initiative.

Hawija is one of the last two significant Iraqi towns, with Tal Afar, still under militant control.