• Tweeter
  • republish

Student demonstration in Iraq against US and Iraqi military interventions in Iraq, January 8, 2020. REUTERS / Essam al-Sudani

The Iranian response has therefore taken place. Tonight, 22 missiles according to the Iraqi security forces were fired from Iran at Iraqi military bases housing American soldiers. No victims are to be deplored according to them. This Iranian response, called by Tehran "Martyr Soleimani" comes just days after General Soleimani's death in Baghdad in an American strike. Two attacks therefore perpetrated on Iraqi soil. Baghdad calls for respecting its national sovereignty.

Reactions multiplied at midday in Iraq, reports our correspondent in Baghdad, Lucile Wassermann . The Prime Minister's Office - now interim, Adul Abdul Mahdi - notably published a press release. It reads that Iran called the Iraqi authorities last night to warn them of an imminent attack on its soil and that almost at the same time the United States also contacted them to warn them of missile attacks on bases military.

Shots that would have made no casualties according to the office of the Prime Minister. In this statement, the authorities call on all countries to respect the sovereignty of Iraq and warns of a crisis that could lead to a "devastating war".

Read also : Iranian missile fire in Iraq: war of press releases and declarations

If on the executive side, unlike the American strike last week, Iraqi officials have not condemned the Iranian response on its soil, the head of the Iraqi Parliament Mohammed al-Halboussi (and former governor of the Sunni province d'Anbar, where Aïn al-Assad's base was hit overnight) denounced him "an Iranian violation of Iraqi sovereignty".

On the side of armed groups close to Tehran, Iraqi militia leaders warn that an Iraqi response is now pending, to avenge Iraqi military chief Abu Mehdi Al Mohandis, killed with General Soleimani. One of the leaders of Hachd al-Chaabi , the coalition of pro-Iran paramilitaries integrated into the Iraqi regular forces, threatened Washington with a "response (...) no less important than the Iranian response".

A large part of the population shouts its anger and demands that Iraq does not become a proxy battlefield between the United States and Iran.