Iraq attacks Iran over missile attack on US bases

Iraqi has expressed anger over Iran’s missile attack on military bases hosting US troops in Baghdad, raising questions over its sovereignty.

There is increasing anger across Iraq following the Wednesday early morning attack.

Many Iraqis are now seeing the attack as a “stark violation of Iraqi sovereignty” and compared it to the US strike that killed Qassem Soleimani, according to Al Jazeera.

Iran fired more than a dozen missiles at two Iraqi military bases early on Wednesday morning.

The US confirmed that the missiles hit the Ain al-Assad airbase in Anbar Province and a facility near Erbil’s airport in northern Iraq.

The attacks came in retaliation for the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp’s (IRGC) Quds Force.

The attacks also came after much threats and escalation of tensions in the Middle East.

Soleimani was killed in Baghdad airport alongside Iraqi paramilitary commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis and many others.

Iraqi President Barham Salih’s office issued a statement on Wednesday to condemn Iran’s missile attack for taking place “on Iraqi soil”.

He also denounced Tehran’s “repeated violation of Iraqi sovereignty and its transformation of Iraq into a battlefield for confrontation between belligerent parties”.

Following the missile attacks Iraq’s Speaker of Parliament Mohamed al-Halbousi issued a statement to “condemn Iran’s violation of Iraqi sovereignty and express complete rejection of transforming Iraq into a spectre for settling scores.”

He added in the statement that his government must take the necessary measures to end the “assault” on Iraq by Iran and the US.

According to him, Iraq country should be left out of confrontations between Washington and Tehran.

Also condemning that assault on Iraq’s soil, Sarkawt Shams, member of the Kurdish Future bloc in the Iraqi parliament, said, “Iran’s actions on Iraqi soil should be condemned just like the US airstrikes were,” Shams told Al Jazeera.