Iran fires ballistic missiles at targets in Iraq, Syria, Baghdad condemns 'aggression'

Europe 1 with AFP 09:57, January 16, 2024

Iran's Revolutionary Guards announced early Tuesday that they had launched several salvos of ballistic missiles at "terrorist" targets in Iraq and Syria, killing at least "four civilians" in Iraqi Kurdistan, according to local authorities in the autonomous region. The strikes carried out by Iran on Monday night come in a tense regional context, against the backdrop of the war in Gaza between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas, which has raised fears of a regional conflagration between the allies of the two sides.

In Washington, an official denounced "a series of reckless and inaccurate strikes." "No U.S. personnel or facilities were targeted," White House National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said. On the outskirts of Erbil, the capital of autonomous Kurdistan in northern Iraq, Iran's Revolutionary Guards said they had targeted and destroyed "a spy headquarters" that they attributed to Israel -- as well as "a gathering of anti-Iranian terrorist groups," according to the official IRNA news agency.

The U.S. State Department stressed that the U.S. was "opposed" to these "irresponsible strikes" that "undermine Iraq's stability." In addition, the Guards Corps announced on its Sepah News website that it had identified in Syria "the gathering places of commanders and main elements linked to recent terrorist operations, in particular the Islamic State" (IS) and had "destroyed them by firing a number of ballistic missiles". He explained that the attack was carried out "in response to the recent crimes of terrorist groups that unjustly martyred a number of our dear compatriots in Kerman and Rask".

On January 3, assailants carried out a suicide bombing attack against a crowd gathered in Kerman, southern Iran, during a memorial ceremony near the grave of General Qassem Soleimani, the former architect of Iran's military operations in the Middle East, who was killed in January 2020 by a US strike in Iraq. The attack, claimed by IS, left around 90 people dead and many wounded.

'Violation of sovereignty'

In Iraqi Kurdistan, at least "four civilians" were killed and six others wounded in Iranian missile strikes, the authorities of the autonomous region announced in a statement, specifying that some of the wounded were in a "critical condition". An AFP correspondent in Erbil heard several loud explosions as the missiles hit an upscale residential area on the outskirts of Erbil, northeast of the Kurdistan capital.

The Kurdistan Security Council has accused Tehran of resorting to "baseless justifications" for its repeated bombing of the region. The region's Prime Minister Masrour Barzani called on "the Baghdad government to take a firm stance against this violation of Iraqi sovereignty", assuring that he would be in contact with "our partners in the international community to put an end to these brutal attacks".

Earlier, the ruling party in Erbil, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), reported the deaths of civilians, including a real estate tycoon, Peshraw Dizayee, his wife and other family members, as their homes were hit. A year ago, Tehran bombed the positions of several armed groups of the Iranian Kurdish opposition, accused in particular of being involved in the protest movement triggered by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini.

Baghdad condemns 'aggression targeting its sovereignty'

Iraq's Foreign Ministry on Tuesday condemned Tehran's deadly missile strikes on autonomous Kurdistan in the north of the country, calling it an "aggression aimed at Iraq's sovereignty and the security of its people".

After these strikes, the Iraqi authorities "will take all necessary legal measures", including "a complaint to the Security Council" of the UN, according to a statement from the Iraqi diplomacy, which announced the formation of a commission of inquiry to prove "to Iraqi and international public opinion the falsity of the allegations of those responsible for these reprehensible acts".

'Espionage operations'

Early Tuesday, the Revolutionary Guards said they had targeted and destroyed an Israeli target in Iraqi Kurdistan -- "the headquarters of the Zionist regime's spies (Mossad)," according to IRNA. The targeted site was allegedly used to "develop espionage operations and plan terrorist actions in the region". While Iraq criminalises any contact with Israel, politicians in autonomous Kurdistan have been complacent on the subject in the past. But Kurdistan's official line remains cautious and denies any connection or desire for normalization with Israel.

According to IRNA, the attack in Erbil comes in retaliation for the recent assassinations of several Revolutionary Guards commanders as well as leaders of the "axis of resistance" -- the name given to Tehran's allies in its fight against Israel. On January 2, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, a strike attributed to Israel killed Hamas' second-in-command, Saleh al-Arouri, and six other leaders and cadres of the Palestinian Islamist movement.

In mid-January, Wissam Tawil, a senior military official in Lebanon's powerful Hezbollah, was killed in southern Lebanon in a strike also attributed to Israel.