French minister in Iraq warns 'work not over' in IS fight

France's defence minister warned that "the work is not over" in the fight against the Islamic State group, despite the jihadists facing the loss of their last scrap of territory.

"The territorial caliphate, which has not yet been wiped out, is being defeated," minister Florence Parly said in the Iraqi capital on Friday.

"We must continue the fight against IS and terrorism in the region because IS is probably in the process of reorganising underground and spreading out."

US-backed fighters in neighbouring Syria are gearing up for a final push to oust IS from the sole village it still holds, all that remains of a proto-state that once spanned swathes of both countries.

President Donald Trump, who committed late last year to pulling US troops out of Syria, has said he expects a final declaration of victory over IS next week. 

Parly called for France "to strengthen the relationship of cooperation and partnership with Iraq", both as part of a US-led coalition and bilaterally, to face the "persistent threat" of IS. 

Trump sparked the ire of Iraqi officials last week when he said he plans to keep American forces in their country to keep an eye on neighbouring Iran, also a major power-broker in Baghdad.

Defence ministers from the anti-IS coalition, of which France is a central member, are set to meet soon to determine how it can maintain a regional "presence", Parly said. 

"It is a proposal that will be made subject to Iraq accepting the conditions of this presence. We are on sovereign territory."

The remarks came after Major General Christopher Ghika, the coalition's deputy commander, described the size of the last patch of land held by the jihadists as "now less than one percent of the original caliphate”.

Recent gains by Kurdish-led forces in Syria have shrunk the Islamic State group's "caliphate" to less than one percent of its original size, the US-led coalition said on Thursday.

The coalition and allied Kurdish forces have captured "approximately 99.5 percent" of IS-controlled territory, he said in a statement.

The jihadists are now clinging on to a small sliver of land near the village of Baghouz in eastern Syria and many residents are fleeing and turning themselves in ahead of a final offensive. 

Jihadists "are attempting to escape through intermixing with the innocent women and children attempting to flee the fighting", coalition deputy commanding general Christopher Ghika was quoted as saying.

"These tactics won't succeed, our Syrian partners are focused on finding ISIS wherever they hide, and our Iraqi partners have secured their borders," he said, using another acronym for IS. 

More than 37,000 people, mostly wives and children of jihadist fighters, have fled IS territory since the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, backed by the US-led coalition, intensified its offensive in December, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based war monitor has said that figure includes some 3,200 suspected jihadists.

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