The Revolutionary Guards, the ideological army of the Islamic Republic of Iran, claimed responsibility on Sunday, March 13, for the firing of missiles on Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. They claimed to have targeted a “strategic center” Israeli and threatened the Jewish state with new operations “destructive”. Authorities in Iraqi Kurdistan had earlier reported that “twelve ballistic missiles”drawn “outside the borders of Iraq, and more precisely of the East”had targeted Erbil, without causing any casualties.
Reacting to Tehran’s statements, the Kurdish authorities said in a statement that the location targeted was a “civilian site”. “There are no Israeli sites in this area, only the new building of the American consulate”said the governor of Erbil, during a press conference. Iraq shares its long eastern border with Iran, which plays an essential political and economic role with its Iraqi neighbour.
Before dawn on Sunday, an AFP correspondent in Erbil, northern Iraq, heard three explosions. The attack was carried out with “twelve ballistic missiles fired against a district of Erbil and aimed at the American consulate”according to a statement from the Kurdistan Counter-Terrorism Unit. “There are no human losses, only material damage”, the statement added. For his part, a spokesman for the US State Department assured that there was no “no damage or casualties at any U.S. government facility.”
The local television channel Kurdistan24, whose studios are not far from the new premises of the American consulate, published on its social networks images of its damaged offices, with collapsed sections of the false ceiling and broken glass. “We condemn this terrorist attack launched against several sectors of Erbil, we call on the inhabitants to remain calm”Kurdistan Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said in a statement.