Iraq Tikrit: looting and lawlessness follow recapture

Baku. 4 April. REPORT.AZ/ Iraqi Shia militia, who helped recapture Tikrit from Islamic State (IS), are being pulled out of the city amid reports of violence and looting.

Report informs referring the information given by the BBC, the militia made up the vast majority of pro-government forces that retook the city over the past week.

But people in Tikrit say the city's liberators have since stolen cars and ransacked government buildings.

Tikrit was captured by Islamic State in June last year in what was an important strategic victory for the group.

The city was ravaged by the fighting that followed and now sits largely empty.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has ordered the arrest of anyone caught looting, but reports suggest the actions of the pro-government paramilitaries have gone beyond theft.

A correspondent for Reuters reported seeing an Islamic State fighter surrounded by a mob and stabbed to death, as well as the corpse of another being dragged by a car.

Ahmed al-Kraim, head of the city's Salahuddin Province council, told the news agency that mobs had burned down "hundreds of houses".