Western allies condemn Iraq rocket attack
LONDON: France, Germany, Italy, Britain and the United States on Wednesday condemned “in the strongest terms” a rocket atack on an airbase in Iraq’s Kurdistan region that killed a foreign contractor.
The firing of more than a dozen rockets in the northwest of the Kurdish regional capital Arbil on Monday wounded at least 14 people, as well as fatally injuring a contractor working for the US military.
“We are united in our view that atacks on US and coalition personnel and facilities will not be tolerated,” the foreign ministers of the five Western allies said in a joint statement.
“Together, our governments will support the government of Iraq’s investigation into the atack with a view to holding accountable those responsible.” The barrage of 107 mm rockets — the same calibre used in recent atacks in Baghdad — was fired late Monday from around eight kilometres west of Arbil.
They appeared to be aimed at a military complex inside the Arbil airport that hosts foreign troops deployed as part of a Us-led coalition that has helped Iraq fight rebels since 2014.
But they struck all over the city’s northwest, including in residential districts where they wounded five civilians.
One US solider was among those injured at the airport, where at least three of the rockets landed.
The nationality of the foreign contractor killed has not been disclosed.
It was the first atack in nearly two months targeting Western military or diplomatic installations in Iraq ater a series of similar incidents blamed on pro-iranian Shiite factions.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Tuesday he was “outraged” at the atack and pledged American support in holding those responsible to account, while the United Nations warned that tensions in Iraq could now escalate.
The top UN envoy for Iraq called for a free and safe environment for elections in Iraq scheduled for October 2021.
For credible elections to take place, it is imperative that parties and candidates operate in a free and safe environment.
The same goes for members of the media. In this regard, recent incidents are highly troubling — to say the least, said Jeanine Hennis-plasschaert, the UN secretary-general’s special representative and head of the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq on Tuesday, Xinhua news agency reported.
“I call on all parties, stakeholders and authorities to come together, to agree on a ‘code of conduct’ and to allow all Iraqi candidates to operate freely — irrespective of ethnicity, gender, language, religion, belief or background,” she told the Security Council in a briefing.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki had said that US officials were working with Iraq to determine exactly who was responsible.
“I will convey that we are outraged” by the atack, shesaid. The Trump administration had said that the death of a US contractor would be a red line and provoke a US escalation in Iraq against Iran-backed groups.
The December 2019 killing of a US civilian contractor in a rocket atack in province of Kirkuk sparked a tit-for-tat fight on Iraqi soil that brought the country to the brink of a proxy war.