Major General Sirwan Barzani, commander of the peshmerga forces in Sector Six announced on Wednesday that the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs had inaugurated a center for monitoring the movements and attacks of ISIS militants.

“We were pleased to have welcomed the Minister of Peshmerga Affairs Shoresh Ismail, and Deputy Minister Abdulkhaliq Bapiri,” Major General Barzani posted on Facebook. 

“After our meeting, his excellency inaugurated the center for overseeing movements and attacks of ISIS terrorists, which is the first of its kind. This center will have a significant impact in protecting peshmerga lives and defending against any threat.”

A security vacuum was created in the territories disputed between Erbil and Baghdad in October 2017 after Iraqi forces and the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces pushed peshmerga forces out of the disputed territories after the Kurdistan Region’s September 2017 independence referendum.

As a result, this area has been exploited by ISIS militants, who have used it as a safe haven and a base for staging attacks, kidnapping civilians, and forcing them to pay taxes under the threat of death.

On September 16, a peshmerga fighter was seriously injured by a bomb planted by ISIS between Tuz Khurmatu and Kifri. On September 13, two Iraqi army officers were killed and several soldiers were wounded in an ISIS attack on a military patrol in northwestern Kirkuk.

On September 19, Iraqi warplanes conducted airstrikes against ISIS positions in Kirkuk as part of a security operation.

Moreover, on August 29, U.S. military forces and Iraqi Security Forces conducted a joint raid in Western Iraq that resulted in the death of 14 ISIS operatives, including four ISIS leaders. During the operation seven U.S. soldiers were injured.

Pentagon Press Secretary Major General Pat Ryder told reporters on September 17 that “ISIS remains a persistent threat broadly speaking, particularly in Syria.”

Read More: Peshmerga and Iraqi Army Carry Out Anti-ISIS Operation

In recent years Kurdish peshmerga forces have carried out several joint operations with the Iraqi army against ISIS in these areas in order to prevent a resurgence of the terrorist group.