Accepting defeat in Iraq, ISIS chief Baghdadi asks fighters to flee

Baghdad [Iraq], Mar. 2(ANI): Islamic State's supreme leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi has delivered a farewell speech where he ordered his fighters to flee urban areas in Mosul and acknowledged the group's defeat in Iraq, according to reports. According to local media reports, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi made a "farewell speech" to his combatants in battlefields, ordering them to "flee and hide in mountainous areas" in Iraq and Syria. The report said Baghdadi ordered the closure of the ISIS office regulating the group's fighters and asked the group's non-Arab fighters to either return to their countries or detonate themselves promising them "72 women in heaven." The Iraqi forces have made remarkable gains since launching a renewed offensive on February 19 to retake western Mosul from the IS militants. Baghdadi, who earlier declared himself as Caliph, issued a statement titled 'farewell speech' which was distributed among the ISIS' preachers and clerics on Tuesday, as the Iraqi Army tightened noose around the group's last remaining territory in Mosul, (ANI)