The airstrikes initiated by the US-led coalition have killed over 6,000 Islamic State fighters, according to the information provided by US Ambassador to Iraq.

MOSCOW, January 22 (Sputnik) — US-led airstrikes have killed over 6,000 Islamic State (IS) fighters, US Ambassador to Iraq Stuart Jones said Thursday.

“We estimate that the airstrikes have now killed more than 6,000 ISIS fighters in Syria and Iraq,” Jones told Al Arabiya in an interview, adding that more than a thousand IS vehicles inside Iraq were destroyed.

Jones said that the bombings had a “devastating effect” on IS, killing more than half of its leaders.

On Wednesday, Kurdish forces fighting IS said that they had recaptured almost 500 square kilometers (almost 200 square miles) in northern Iraq in an offensive assisted by US-led airstrikes.

Meanwhile, the anti-IS coalition, co-chaired by the US Secretary of State John Kerry, gathered Thursday for talks in London. Foreign ministers of 21 countries have discussed further actions in countering a global terrorist threat posed by IS activity.

The Islamic State is a jihadist group that has taken vast areas across Iraq and Syria under its control, where it established a caliphate governed under the tenets of sharia law. The militant group began operating in Syria in 2012 and invaded Iraq in 2014. The group is notorious for its human rights atrocities, including beheading, against journalists, aid workers and civilians.