Iraqi security forces expect to encounter tough resistance when they launch a promised offensive in Diyala province, an Al-Qaeda stronghold north of the capital, a top official said on Sunday.
"Very soon there will be a big operation by our security forces in Diyala," interior ministry spokesman Major General Abul Karim Khalaf told reporters without giving a specific timeframe.
"There will be fighting. It is going to be tough," Khalaf conceded.
"We hope to succeed. We already have people there collecting information. Inshallah (God willing) we will succeed as we did in other places."
Diyala and its capital Baquba remain one of the most dangerous areas of Iraq with frequent suicide attacks, including several carried out by female bombers, and car bombings.
In January, Iraqi and US troops launched "Operation Iron Harvest" in Diyala aimed at running Al-Qaeda out of long-held strongholds.
One of the major successes of that operation was the wresting of control of the "breadbasket" farmlands surrounding the town of Muqdadiyah, which the jihadists had tightly controlled for more than a year.
However, Al-Qaeda still maintains a grip on other parts of the province despite numerous subsequent operations by US and Iraqi forces.
Iraqi security forces have also carried out a series of offensives in other provinces this year, including against Shiite militia in Basra and Maysan in the south, and against Al-Qaeda loyalists in and around the main northern city of Mosul.
Khalaf said Iraqi forces were now in control of Basra, the oil rich Shiite region.
"Basra is a priority as it is the economic capital of Iraq. There were lot of murders of scientists, teachers, senior citizens and religious figures," he said, adding that the province was full of "gangs and criminals."
"Sometimes they were more than our forces. But since March there has been a big operation of Iraqi forces. It was very hard, very difficult operation," he said.
"Today, Basra is totally under control of Iraqi forces and crime and violence there has fallen to an average level."
In Basra, Iraqi forces faced stiff resistance from the Mahdi Army militia of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr when they launched the operation on March 25.
The firefights in Basra quickly spread to other Shiite regions, including Sadr City in Baghdad, the sprawling district of some two million Shiites.
Hundreds of people were killed in these clashes before a ceasefire came into effect on May 10.
