Cities and culture under attack in Iraq

(Vatican Radio) Iraqi forces continued their offensive against the Islamic State group on Friday, to retake the city of Tikrit a day after the extremists reportedly destroyed an important archaeological site of the ancient city of Nimrud.

Listen to Lydia O’Kane’s report

Tikrit, the hometown of Saddam Hussein, which lies 130 kilometers north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, has been under the control of the Islamic State group since June.

Iraqi forces who began their offensive on Monday to retake the city continued their push against the militant group into a fourth day.

The United Nations says about 28,000 people have fled their homes in the Iraqi city seeking safety from the military operation.

Many of the people, headed towards the city of Samarra.

The Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq, Archbishop Louis Sako spoke to Vatican Radio of the human cost of the conflict on the people. "Many families lived in a miserable situation... this winter, it is terrible and then we don't know, they are making this war but we don't know the end and how many people will be killed."

Meanwhile,

Officials and archeologists have expressed outrage after IS militants ``bulldozed'' the renowned archaeological site of the ancient city of Nimrud in northern Iraq on Thursday night.

The rampage is part of the group's plan to enforce its interpretation of Islamic law, destroying ancient archaeological sites it says promoted apostasy.

Archbishop Sako said history is being destroyed. "This city is a very old city, before Christianity and before Islam, so ISIS is killing people, is destroying history."

Earlier this week, Islamic State militants were seen in a video destroying ancient artifacts at the museum in Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city which was also captured by IS last year.