Flag of IraqAFP
Published 04/19/2024 21:18
A “bombing” hit a military base in central Iraq that hosts troops from the Army and the former pro-Iranian paramilitary group Hashd al Shaabi, now integrated into regular forces, two security sources said.
When asked by AFP, a military official and another from the Ministry of the Interior were unable to identify those responsible for the bombing at the Calso base, in the province of Babilônia.
The ministerial official noted that the attack left “one dead and eight injured”.
In turn, the military official reported that there are at least three injured among the Iraqi Army personnel.
“Due to the bombing, there were explosions in the warehouses that house the equipment”, explained this official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.
“A fire is still affecting some sectors and the search for injured people continues,” he added.
The ministry source assured that the bombing was aimed at Hashd al Shaabi’s armored vehicles. “The explosion reached the material, the weapons, the vehicles,” he said.
The action, whose authorship was not claimed, takes place in an explosive context in the region resulting from the war in Gaza between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, supported by Iran.
This Friday, attacks attributed to Israel hit the Iranian region of Isfahan, near a military base.
The previous Saturday, Tehran had launched an unprecedented attack with drones and missiles against Israel, in response to a previous bombing against its consulate in Damascus, Syria, which had claimed the lives of seven Iranian soldiers, including two generals.
The Hashd al Shaabi group is part of Iraq’s official security apparatus, but brings together several pro-Iranian armed factions that carried out attacks in Iraq and Syria against American soldiers mobilized as part of an international anti-jihadist coalition.
