Iran says it has repeatedly warned Iraq and Al-Kazemi in Erbil to inspect the effects of the bombing

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said on Monday that Tehran has repeatedly warned the Iraqi authorities that Iraq's territory should not be used by third parties to launch attacks on Iran.

Khatibzadeh was speaking a day after the Iranian Revolutionary Guard attacked the northern Iraqi city of Erbil with 12 ballistic missiles, in an unprecedented attack on the center of the autonomous Kurdistan region of Iraq.

Iranian official media said that the Revolutionary Guard launched the attack on Israeli "strategic centers" in Erbil, noting that it came in retaliation after recent Israeli air strikes that killed members of the Iranian army in Syria.

Khatibzadeh: The Iraqi government is responsible for ensuring that its territory is not used by a third party to launch attacks on Iran (Anatolia)

Khatibzadeh said Iraq's central government was responsible for ensuring that its territory was not used by a third party as a base to launch attacks on Iran.

"Iraq's territory has been used repeatedly before against Iran by third parties, including terrorist groups such as Kurdish fighters, the United States and the Zionist entity," he added.

The KRG said the attack only targeted civilian residential areas and not foreign countries' sites, and called on the international community to conduct an investigation.

Sunday's attack comes at a time when talks aimed at reviving the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal face the possibility of their collapse after Russia made a demand that forced world powers to halt negotiations for an indefinite period, despite the existence of an almost complete text of the agreement.

In another sign of rising regional tension, Iran decided on Sunday to suspend a fifth round of talks with Saudi Arabia that had been scheduled to start this week in Baghdad.

Following the attack on Erbil, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan announced his country's condemnation of the Iranian attack on Erbil, noting that Washington would support Baghdad and governments across the region in the face of threats from Tehran.

And the Counter-Terrorism Service in the region announced, in a statement, that Erbil was subjected to a missile attack launched from outside Iraq from the east, and targeted a neighborhood near the American consulate, without causing casualties.

Prime Minister @MAKadhimi meets in Erbil with the President of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Mr. Masoud Barzani @masoud_barzani .

pic.twitter.com/XcIaBKy3Tp

— Media Office of the Prime Minister 🇮🇶 (@IraqiPMO) March 14, 2022

The attack was met with local and international condemnation, as Baghdad asked Tehran to provide explicit explanations for the attack, while Washington, the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Iraq, the United Nations and various Arab countries condemned the missile attack.

And this Monday morning, the Iraqi Prime Minister, Mustafa Al-Kazemi, who is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, accompanied by a large ministerial and security delegation, arrived in Erbil to discuss the repercussions of the Iranian missile bombing.

Al-Kazemi was received at Erbil International Airport by the President of the Kurdistan Regional Government, Masrour Barzani, and he met the head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Massoud Barzani.