Nearly half the 300 special operations soldiers promised by US President Barack Obama are in Baghdad or on the front lines of the fight. 

 

The rest are expected within days.

 

Also, US Secretary of State John Kerry called for regional unity⁴ to expel the Sunni Isis rebels who have taken large swathes（带子，包装品） of Iraq.

 

On Tuesday, two teams totalling 40 US troops began work assessing Iraqi troops on the front line, the Pentagon said.

 

John Kerry told the BBC's Kim Ghattas ''a united Iraq is a stronger Iraq''

 

An additional 90 personnel will work in Baghdad to set up a new joint⁵ operations command centre.

 

Those teams will be joined by an additional four teams of 50 troops each in the next few days.

 

The Obama administration has stressed the troops are not intended as operational forces but instead are there to advise the Iraqis and provide intelligence, reports the BBC's David Willis in Washington.

 

The Iraqi government had requested American air strikes, but Mr Obama has been reluctant to do anything that could lead to accusations⁶ the US was taking sides in a sectarian conflict, our correspondent reports. 

 

The insurgents⁷, spearheaded by Islamists fighting under the banner of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis), have overrun much of north and west Iraq, including the second-biggest city, Mosul.

 

The violence has claimed at least 1,075 lives in Iraq in June alone, most of them civilians⁸, a United Nations human rights team has reported.

 

Sunni fighters target Baghdad as John Kerry calls for unity

 

The UN said the figures, which include a number of verified summary executions, should be viewed as an absolute minimum.

 

In an interview on Tuesday with the BBC, Mr Kerry called for a "political strategy" and for regional co-operation to resolve Iraq's unrest.

 

"Every country in the region will combine in order to take on and expel Isis because it is simply unacceptable to have a terrorist organisation⁹ grabbing territory and challenging the legitimacy¹⁰ of governments," Mr Kerry told the BBC's Kim Ghattas.

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