Baghdad: Daesh leaders were killed in an air strike in western Iraqi town, but Daesh chief Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi was not among them, hospital officials said on Sunday.
Earlier on Sunday, Iraqi security forces claimed to have struck Al Baghdadi's convoy in an air strike near the country's border with Syria, although it said that the Daesh leader's "health status is unknown".
"The Iraqi air force carried out a heroic operation targeting the convoy of the criminal terrorist Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi," Iraq's security forces said in a joint statement.
Iraqi security sources have previously said that Al Baghdadi had been injured or killed in strikes in the past but the claims were either never verified or later denied.
The statement was released by the "war media cell", a structure which provides updates on the war against Daesh and speaks for the interior and defence ministries as well as the paramilitary Popular Mobilisation forces.
The statement said Iraqi aircraft struck Baghdadi's convoy as it was "moving towards Karabla to attend a meeting of the Daesh terrorist leaders".
Daesh last year proclaimed a caliphate straddling Iraqi and Syria.
Karabla is located on the Euphrates river barely five kilometres from the border with Syria. The statement did not make clear when the strike was carried out.
It said the operation was conducted in coordination with Iraq's interior ministry intelligence services and the joint operation command centre that includes military advisers from the US-led coalition.
