MOSCOW (Sputnik) — More than 250,000 refugees have returned to their homes in the northern Iraqi province of Nineveh since the start of the military operation aimed at liberating Mosul from the Daesh terror group, the country's Ministry of Displacement and Migration said Wednesday in a statement.
"The number of people, who returned to their areas of inhabitancy in the Nineveh province since the start of the operation on its liberation amounts to 253,300… The total number of refugees from the province amounts to 952,621 people," the statement said.
According to Minister of Displacement and Migration Mohammed Jaaf, a total of 34,902 refugees from the Nineveh province returned home in July.
Jaaf added that at the same time 68,000 people had left cities controlled by the Islamists.
The Daesh terrorist group took over Mosul, the second largest Iraqi city, in June 2014. The operation aimed at liberating the city from terrorists began in October 2016.
On July 9, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi officially announced that Iraqi security forces had finally liberated Mosul after months of fighting against the Daesh.
