ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - A Peshmerga soldier was wounded in a landmine blast, believed to be remains of the Islamic State (ISIS), in the town of Tuz Khurmatu, south of Kirkuk on Monday morning, confirmed a military official.

The landmine set off in the village of Qori Cha, Tuz Khurmatu, injuring a Peshmerga soldier who belonged to Brigade 20.

“The injured Peshmerga has been rushed to Kirkuk where he will be receiving necessary treatments,” Mohammed Ali, spokesperson of Tuz Khurmatu Police, told The New Region. 

The Peshmerga Ministry in a statement identified the injured Peshmerga who “lost a leg” in the blast as Mohammed Ahmed Ali, a resident of Tuz Khurmatu

Brigade 20 is a joint force established by Iraq’s defense ministry and the Peshmerga ministry of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). It has been stationed in the security vacuum between Erbil and Baghdad.

The force is primarily tasked with foiling ISIS plots, draining their resources and crippling their abilities form using the remote areas to regroup and launch attacks on either side. 

Home to Kurds, Arabs, and Turkmen, Tuz Khurmatu is located in Salahaddin province. It is part of the regions disputed between the central government and the KRG.

Security gaps were created in the wake of the Kurdistan Region’s 2017 independence referendum which also was held in the disputed regions. Soon after it was held, Iran-backed Shiite Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) and the Iraqi army pushed Kurdish Peshmerga forces out of the area, paving the way for ISIS militants to regroup and build hideouts in them.

Seven years into the ultimate territorial defeat of ISIS, the group remains a security threat in Iraq through its remnants. 

The Iraqi ministry of the interior on Friday announced that in a late August operation, they killed Abu Muslim, the extremist group’s second most powerful man in Iraq. 

ISIS controlled large swathes of territory in parts of Iraq and Syria following their rise in 2014. The group was declared territorially defeated in 2019. 

Though they no longer control any territory, they are active in their hit-and-run operations, posing serious danger to security around the areas that they had once controlled.