Sunni rebels from an al-Qaida splinter group overran the Iraqi city of Tikrit on Wednesday and closed in on the biggest oil refinery in the country, making further gains in their rapid military advance against the Shiite-led government in Baghdad.
The threat to the Baiji refinery comes after militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) seized the northern city of Mosul, advancing their aim of creating a Sunni Caliphate straddling the border between Iraq and Syria.
The fall of Mosul, Iraq's second biggest city, is a blow to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's attempts to defeat the militants, who have seized territory in Iraq over the past year following the withdrawal of U.S. forces.