“Barzani told me that the Kurds don’t have ambitions in Nineveh,” al-Abadi said following a cabinet meeting on Tuesday. 

The meeting discussed preparations for an anticipated offensive to recapture Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, from ISIL group. 

“The fighting capabilities of ISIL gangs have badly diminished after hundreds of its militants were killed,” al-Abadi said. 

He said Iraqi forces and allied fighters had killed a large number of foreign ISIL fighters in al-Khalidiya Island, 23km east of Ramadi. 

On Saturday, the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs said the Kurdish forces don’t have ambitions to capture any new areas in Iraq, reiterating that the Kurdish forces were ready to cooperate with the Iraqi army to fight ISIL group. 

Iraqi Defense Minister Khaled al-Obeidi also said there was a great cooperation between the peshmerga forces and Iraqi troops with a view to retaking Mosul. 

Backed by U.S.-led airstrikes, Iraqi forces have managed to retake most of the territory seized by ISIL since 2014. The extremist group, however, still controls several parts in the country.