Abu Ali al-Basri, head of the intelligence body known as Falcons Cell, told the state-owned Assabah newspaper that the Islamic State (ISIS) was planning its biggest attack of 2019.
"The aim of those attacks by ISIS was to show everybody that they are still alive and exist," al-Basri told the newspaper.
The operation is a collaboration between the Baghdad Operations Command, the Federal Police, the Army, intelligence services, the Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitary forces (PMFs), the Air Force and the US-led international anti-ISIS coalition forces.
Al-Basri told Assabah the Falcons Cell arrested 160 ISIS terrorists in Mosul, 40 in Baghdad and another two in Basra in relation to the plot.
The head policeman in the Nineveh province, where Mosul is located, did not confirm the figures in Assabah, but said his forces have arrested hundreds of ISIS fighters recently.
"We are continuously arresting ISIS militants in Nineveh, and for the past five months, we have arrested more than 600 ISIS militants in Mosul and its surroundings," Hamad Namis told Rudaw English.
Kurdistan Region security forces, known as the Asayish, declined to comment to Rudaw on the reported operation.
In May, a US Defense Department told the US think tank Center for a New American Security that around 10,000 ISIS fighters and supporters remain in Iraq and Syria. Since the loss of their territory, they have resorted to insurgent tactics including bombings, ambushes, kidnapping, extortion, and arson in Iraq.
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