"The density of the local fighting for those [Iraqi] ground forces has changed," the US news magazine quoted Isler as saying from coalition headquarters in Baghdad. "What has not changed is our support, our diligence in making sure we are taking the appropriate levels to make sure we are avoiding any harm to innocent civilians."
Isler declined to discuss accounts of dead civilians, but he noted that the area where the casualties reportedly occurred was within 500 meters of positions held by Iraqi ground forces, according to an article in US News and World Report.
Isler also told the US magazine that fighting in Iraq's second-largest city has intensified to unprecedented levels now that fighters from Daesh are surrounded and that their leaders and foreign comrades have fled.
Sputnik News in Turkey cited Aydin Maruf, a representative of the Iraqi Turkmen Front, as confirming the death of 200 civilians due to the bombings carried out by coalition forces on Islamic State positions in Mosul.
It was unclear from multiple reports, however, whether the casualties were due to air strikes or Iraqi ground forces fire.
