Patel said that Iraq knew about the US strikes as soon as they occurred (Al Jazeera)
Vedant Patel, deputy spokesman for the US State Department, said on Monday that the United States did not provide prior notification to Iraq before the strikes it launched last Friday on three militant sites inside Iraqi territory, adding that Iraq was notified of the strikes immediately after they occurred.
Battle pointed out that Iraq knew, like every other country in the region, that there would be a response after the killing of the three American soldiers in Jordan, as he put it.
White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby claimed last Friday that the United States had informed Iraq before carrying out the strikes.
However, Iraq denied the existence of any prior coordination for the United States to launch strikes on its territory, describing what Washington announced as a false claim aimed at misleading international public opinion.
After the American strikes, Baghdad summoned the Charge d'Affairs of the American Embassy and handed him an official protest note, stressing that the strikes were a blatant violation of Iraq's sovereignty.
The United States vowed to launch other strikes in the region after the strikes targeted 85 targets - some of them belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard - in Iraq and Syria, resulting in the death and injury of dozens, in response to the killing of its soldiers in Jordan, which it said was carried out by the “Islamic resistance in Iraq.”
For its part, Iran denied that there were any Revolutionary Guard sites in the areas targeted by the United States.
Meanwhile, the UN Security Council - after a request from Russia - is examining the US strikes on both Syria and Iraq and the extent of their impact on peace and stability in the region.
Source: Al Jazeera + Reuters