BAGHDAD: Iraq has lost Fallujah to Al-Qaeda-linked fighters, a senior security official said Saturday, putting militants back in control of a city where American forces repeatedly battled insurgents.

“Fallujah is under the control of ISIL,” a senior security official in Anbar province told AFP, referring to Al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

However, the city’s outskirts were in the hands of local police, the official added. An AFP journalist inside Fallujah also said ISIL seemed to be in control, with no security forces or Sahwa anti-Al-Qaeda militiamen visible on the streets.

Meanwhile, Iraqi ground forces commander Staff Gen. Ali Ghaidan Majeed told AFP that police and tribesmen were hunting for militants in Ramadi, with army support.

And he said authorities were working on “fixing the situation in Fallujah.”

Majeed said there are three groups involved in the fighting: Security forces and allied tribes, ISIL, and forces of the anti-government “Military Council of the Tribes.”

On Friday alone, more than 100 people were killed in Ramadi and Fallujah, in the country’s deadliest single day in years.

Hundreds of gunmen, some bearing the black flags often flown by mujahideen, gathered at outdoor Friday prayer, where one militant announced that “Fallujah is an Islamic state,” a witness said.

Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki vowed Saturday to eliminate “all terrorist groups” in Iraq’s Anbar province.

“We will not back down until we end all terrorist groups and save our people in Anbar,” Al-Maliki was quoted as saying by Iraqiya state television.

Many residents have fled Fallujah. The city’s streets are all but empty except for cars navigating alleys in an attempt to escape clashes and shelling on the outskirts.

Five days after the killing began, garbage is piled up in some streets, while others are littered with bullet casings from the fighting.

All electricity in the city is cut, and there is no fuel to operate the generators that normally plug gaps in government-provided power.