American air-strike kills Islamic State finance chief

A senior member of Islamic State's financial network was killed in airstrikes in late November, a US army spokesman confirmed on Thursday in a Pentagon briefing.

Muwaffaq Mustafa Mohammed al-Karmoush, also known as Abu Salah, held a position in the Islamic State's 'cabinet' as the minister of finance, according to important documents seized from the house of a member of the militant group in a raid by the Iraqi military in July last year.

The spokesman Colonel Steven Warren further that Karmoush was the third member of the group's finance network to be killed in as many months.

"He was one of the most senior and experienced members of ISIL's financial network and he was a legacy Al Qaeda member," Warren said, adding "killing him and his predecessors exhausts the knowledge and talent needed to coordinate funding within the organization".

Two other senior leaders in the group were also killed during the strike.

Abu Mariam, a senior Islamic State chief in charge of extortion activities and Abu Waqman al-Tunisi, who co-ordinated the transfer of people, weapons and intelligence, Warren confirms.

The three were killed "as part of the coalition campaign to destroy Isil's financial infrastructure" American special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter Islamic State, Brett McGurk, said on Twitter on Thursday.

The US led coalition has been carrying out targeted attacks on figures involved in Islamic State's finance network in attempt to disrupt the group's revenue stream since May.

A key IS militant, Fathi Ben Awn Ben Jildi Murad al-Tunisi, also known as Abu Sayyaf, was killed in a firefight following a rare US Special Forces ground operation in Deir Ezzour in Syria in May.