'Islamic State' carries out mass killing of tribespeople

'Islamic State' (IS) militants have carried out the mass execution of at least 50 people from the Albu Nimr tribe in Iraq as part of a killing campaign that began last week, officials in Anbar province said on Saturday.

A councilman in Anbar, Faleh al-Issawi, said the people were lined up and killed in a village north of the provincial capital of Ramadi in retaliation for having resisted the group's advance through the region.

Members of the tribe who had been displaced from the Anbar town of Hit when it was taken by IS last month held out against the IS fighters for weeks, but finally ran low on necessary supplies. The jihadists have since carried out a campaign to round up and kill the tribespeople, with more than 300 people executed since the middle of last week.

A security official said, also on Saturday, that 35 bodies from another such execution had been found in a mass grave.

During its advance across Iraq and Syria, IS has killed civilians, security personnel and minorities, as well as kidnapping and selling women into slavery.

Although a US-led coalition has been carrying out airstrikes to support government efforts in both countries to stop the insurgents gaining more ground, the group has continued its campaign to establish an Islamic 'caliphate' in the region virtually unabated.

tj/sb (AP, Reuters)