Mosul

An official declaration of victory from the government is expected soon.

Iraqi forces, backed by US-led air strikes, have tried to retake the city since 17 October last year.

IS seized Mosul in June 2014 before sweeping across much of Iraq's Sunni Arab heartland and proclaiming a "caliphate" straddling Iraq and Syria.

But they have been losing ground over the past nine months, as government forces advance on their former Iraqi stronghold.

Her face is etched with small wounds, gauze wrapped around her throat and leg over burns that have yet to heal. She can't open her eyes; there is shrapnel in one of them, the other painfully closed. Doctors don't know if she will be able to see properly again.

Her grandmother is lost for words. Tears start to fall.

The US-led coalition has acknowledged hitting a vehicle carrying explosives in the March 17 strike -- though US officials have not confirmed the Iraqi military's account of exactly what happened.

Confusion has surrounded events during airstrikes on the city between March 17 and 23 after allegations emerged that as many as 200 civilians had been killed there.

US Central Command, which oversees US military Middle East operations, said the request for the strike came from the Iraqi security forces and struck ISIS fighters and equipment.

Australia is one of the coalition partners conducting air strikes against suspected ISIS targets in Mosul, and the ABC has asked the Australian Defence Force to confirm Australian aircraft were not involved in the incident.

Civil Defence chief Brigadier Mohammed Al-Jawari said rescue teams had recovered 40 bodies and that many others lay buried in the rubble.

Brett McGurk, the senior US official in the counter-IS coalition, issued the warning after Iraqi forces cut off the last road out of the city, trapping IS fighters inside.

The jihadists have held Mosul, Iraq's second city, since 2014.

But Iraqi forces have managed to retake large areas in a months-long offensive.

They now control all of Mosul's eastern side, and the latest US-backed push against IS - which began on 5 March - has forced the extremists from key locations in the west, including the main local government headquarters and the famed Mosul museum.

A man carrying his child in his arms, looks back over his surroundings with unease after huddling in his home for days as intense fighting raged outside.

Suddenly, a huge blast erupts nearby; scattering Iraqi soldiers and civilians in the city's war-torn streets as a massive plume of black smoke rises.

This is the dramatic footage, shot by freelance cameraman Ricardo Garcia Vilanova, more than two weeks after the offensive to drive ISIS out of west Mosul began.

The patients, who are being treated in hospital in nearby Irbil, are "showing clinical symptoms consistent with an exposure to a blistering chemical agent," said Robert Mardini, the organization's regional director for the Middle East.

The five children, three women and four men have symptoms that include blisters, coughing, redness in the eyes, irritation, and vomiting.

They also stormed a nearby military camp, according to state TV.

The airport and the al-Ghazlani base are on Mosul's southern outskirts on the western side of the Tigris river.

Iraqi forces have already pushed IS out of the eastern part of the city. More than 160,000 people have fled their homes in and around the city.

Iraqi forces have had control of the eastern part of the city, which is divided by the Tigris River, since January.

The leaflets say Iraqi forces are making advancements to the western side and "provide guidance and recommendations" for citizens ahead of the offensive, according to a statement from the Iraqi Joint Operations Command (JOC).

The leaflets also warn ISIS members to "lay down their weapons and surrender before they face their inevitable fate at the hands of our heroic forces," the statement said.

The freezing nights, the food shortages and -- worst of all -- the mortars and artillery shells that land with terrifying regularity on this area of desert, which is a temporary home to sheep and cattle herders.

"Yesterday a mortar attack killed a baby in his crib," says Abu Tiba. "And they couldn't transfer the mother to a hospital so she died too."