WASHINGTON — A top specialist in chemical weapons for the Islamic State who is in American custody in northern Iraq
has given military interrogators detailed information that resulted in
two allied airstrikes in the last week against the group’s illicit
weapons sites, Defense Department officials said Wednesday.
The
prisoner, an Iraqi identified by officials as Sleiman Daoud al-Afari,
was captured a month ago by commandos with an elite American Special
Operations force. He was described by three officials as a “significant
operative” in the Islamic State’s chemical weapons program. Another
official said he once worked for Saddam Hussein’s Military
Industrialization Authority.
The
Islamic State’s use of chemical weapons in Iraq and Syria has been
known, but Mr. Afari’s capture has provided the United States with the
opportunity to learn detailed information about the group’s secretive
program, including where chemical agents were being stored and produced.
Under
interrogation, Mr. Afari told his captors how the group had weaponized
sulfur mustard and loaded it into artillery shells, the officials said.
Based on information from Mr. Afari, the United States-led air campaign
conducted one strike against a weapons production plant in Mosul, Iraq,
and another against a “tactical unit” near Mosul that was believed to be
related to the program, the officials said.
Pentagon
officials refused to publicly acknowledge the capture and interrogation
of Mr. Afari, saying that they did not want to reveal details of what
the American Special Operations team is doing in Iraq. But, “We know
they have used chemical weapons in both Iraq and Syria,” a Pentagon
spokesman, Capt. Jeff Davis, said on Wednesday, referring to the Islamic
State. “This is a group that does not observe international norms.”
Captain
Davis said “in large doses” the sulfur mustard agent “can certainly
kill,” citing a case last year of a Syrian baby who died after a
chemical attack unleashed by the Islamic State on her home in northern
Syria.
Dozens
of people in the northern Iraqi town of Taza suffered from respiratory
and skin irritation after a mortar and rocket barrage there by Islamic
State militants, in what local officials said on Wednesday was a
chemical attack.
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