The battle to oust Islamic State extremists from Mosul is going "more quickly than we thought", the Iraqi PM has said.
The comment by Haider al Abadi came as Iraqi special forces joined the campaign to retake Iraq's second-largest city and IS stronghold.
"Our forces have started to move forward to free this city which was taken by IS over two years ago," he said.
"The fighting forces are currently pushing forward toward the town more quickly than we thought, and more quickly certainly than we established in our plan of campaign."
Mr Abadi said "pockets of resistance" remain but residents of the region have largely welcomed the advancing Iraqi forces.
The Iraqi army elite unit and Kurdish Peshmerga fighters have started trying to take back villages north and east of Mosul.
The elite US-trained force, called Golden Division, said they entered the town of Bartella from the east after a heavy gun battle that saw IS militants unleash a number of suicide truck bombs.
The addition of the elite force marked a significant intensification of the fight. As they advanced, attack helicopters fired on the militants and heavy gunfire echoed across the plains.
Golden Division is expected to lead the charge into Mosul.
So far, the fighting has been concentrated in a cluster of towns and villages outside Mosul that are mostly uninhabited.
Islamic State militants have planted roadside bombs and dispatched suicide bombers, which has slowed down the campaign.
The Peshmerga announced a "large-scale operation" to the north and northeast of Mosul.
"The operation will be in three fronts," they said in a statement. It comes after recent gains by the Kurds to the east of Mosul and Iraqi security forces to the south.
The fight for Mosul is expected to be the biggest battle in Iraq since the 2003 US- led invasion, and will likely last weeks or months.
Around 1.5 million people still live in the city, and officials fear Islamic State militants are using civilians as human shields.
Mr Abadi, speaking in a video transmission to a diplomatic meeting about Mosul in Paris, promised to protect civilians displaced by the battle and respect the human rights of the region's diverse population.
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