Iraq’s prime minister Nuri al-Maliki sacked Tuesday four top security force officers, including the top commander for Nineveh province in the north for abandoning their "professional and military duty"

Iraq's prime minister Nuri al-Maliki sacked Tuesday four top security force officers, including the top commander for Nineveh province in the north for abandoning their "professional and military duty" a week after the fall of the northwest city of Mosul to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militants, the government said.

Maliki also ordered that one of the officers he sacked face court-martial for desertion.

A major offensive by ISIL overran all of Nineveh and chunks of three more provinces in a matter of days.