ISIS used chlorine gas

Iraqi Kurdish authorities said they have evidence that Islamic State had used chlorine gas as a chemical weapon against their peshmerga fighters in northern Iraq in January.

The Security Council of the semi-autonomous Kurdish region said in a statement to Reuters that the peshmerga had taken soil and clothing samples after an Islamic State car bombing attempt on Jan 23.

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It said laboratory analysis showed "the samples contained levels of chlorine that suggested the substance was used in weaponised form." The Kurdish allegation could not be independently confirmed.

Chlorine is a choking agent whose use as a chemical weapon dates back to World War One. It is banned under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention, which prohibits all use of toxic agents on the battlefield.

Chlorine has been used "systematically" in the civil war in neighboring Syria, an OPCW fact-finding mission found last year.

The White House said in a statement it could not confirm the allegations but found them "deeply disturbing" and was monitoring the situation "very closely."

Western diplomats in The Hague, where the OPCW is based, have long feared ISIS fighters would get their hands on chemical weapons. It is not easy to make such weapons and ISIS tried to recruit experts when it took over Mosul last year, diplomatic sources told Reuters. They were not believed to have been successful.

Meanwhile, one of the Iraqi commanders yesterday said that air strikes by the US-led coalition would help win the battle to retake the Iraqi city of Tikrit from the Islamic State group.

 Staff Lieutenant General Abdulwahab al-Saadi said he had asked the defence ministry to request coalition involvement but "no air support was provided."

Shia Iran has been Baghdad's main foreign partner in the operation. Officials in Washington have expressed unease at the level of Iranian involvement in Tikrit, an overwhelmingly Sunni city which was executed dictator Saddam Hussein's hometown.

Tikrit is seen by commanders as a key stepping stone on the way to reconquering IS's northern hub of Mosul, Iraq's second city.