Iraqi forces battled militants inside Mosul for the third day running yesterday while civilians risked their lives dodging bombs and snipers to slip out of the city.

US-backed Kurdish-Arab forces launched an offensive Sunday on the Islamic State group's de facto Syrian capital Raqa, upping pressure on the jihadists who are already battling Iraqi troops in Mosul.

At least 27 people were killed on Sunday in a series of suicide bombings, including one where an ambulance was used, which were claimed by Islamic State in Iraq's northern province of Salah al-Din.

A Kurdish militant group that has carried out a string of attacks in Turkey this year on Sunday claimed a bombing on the southeastern city of Diyarbakir that killed 11.

A suicide attacker detonated an ambulance packed with explosives in Tikrit on Sunday, killing nine people at the southern entrance to the city, police and hospital sources said.

Ten bodies were recovered yesterday from a rubber dinghy off the Libyan coast, the Italian coastguard said, adding that 2,100 other migrants had been rescued during the day.

Unidentified jets yesterday bombed rebel-held areas in Aleppo, a day after the end of a temporary truce announced by Russia for the divided northern city, a monitoring group reported.

Iraqi forces said yesterday they had captured a key town some 15km south of Mosul, while an aid agency reported a sharp rise in the numbers of civilians fleeing since fighting reached the outskirts of the Islamic State-held city.

UN Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov said yesterday that residents of the Gaza strip need jobs and hope more than a harbour and airport, a reference to recent comments by Israel’s defence minister.

On the edge of the Sahara desert, Morocco is building one of the world’s biggest solar power plants in a project largely funded by the European Union.

Ireland's foreign ministry is investigating reports that an Irish citizen died in a suicide attack near the Iraqi city of Mosul, a spokesman said on Saturday.

A news outlet linked to the Islamic State said its fighters staged a bombing that killed 11 people in southeastern Turkey, according to US-based monitors, after Ankara blamed Kurdish militants for the attack.