French warplanes destroyed an Islamic State command centre at Tal Afar, some 45 kilometres west of Mosul in Iraq, a French official said on Tuesday.

"We hit an Islamic State command centre at Tal Afar," the official said during President Francois Hollande's visit to meet his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama in Washington.

"The target was destroyed."

The Rafale fighter jets took off from the Charles De Gaulle aircraft carrier earlier in the day, the official said. – Reuters