Air strike kills four Iran-linked fighters in Iraq 

Iraq’s prime minister has told United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio that his country should not be used as a launchpad for attacks in the Middle East war, the Iraqi government said.

This comes as several strikes were launched across Iraq on Tuesday, including one that hit a group affiliated with the mostly Shia Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF).

Iraq neighbours Iran, against which the US and Israel launched a war on February 28, as well as the Gulf, which Iran has hit with missile and drone attacks.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Tuesday they hit a US base in Iraq’s Kurdistan region. “The headquarters of the invading US army in Al-Harir Air Base in the Kurdistan region was targeted with five missiles,” they said in a statement on their Telegram channel.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Iran-backed Kataib Imam Ali group, affiliated with the PMF, said four of its members were killed and 12 injured in air attacks in northern Iraq that it blamed on the US.

The group claimed its fighters were killed in “American aggression” against their position in the Dibis district of Kirkuk province.

The bombing hit a position that belongs to the PMF, which is an alliance of factions now integrated into Iraq’s regular army and which includes powerful Iran-backed groups.

The Iraqi government’s security information cell confirmed that several PMF fighters were killed in a “bombing” in Kirkuk, though it did not attribute the strike to anyone.

In Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani’s phone call with Rubio, he stressed “the importance of ensuring that Iraqi airspace, territory, and waters are not used for any military action targeting neighbouring countries or the region”, the prime minister’s media office said on Tuesday.

Sudani rejected “any attempt to drag the country into ongoing conflicts”, as well as “violations of its airspace by any party”.

Since the start of the Middle East war, bases belonging to the PMF have been hit several times, with strikes against pro-Iran fighters.

Iraq, long a proxy battleground between the US and Iran, had said it did not want to be dragged into the war. However, Iraq was drawn into the conflict from the outset, with attacks blamed on the US and Israel against Iran-backed groups, which have since claimed attacks on US bases in Iraq and the wider region.

Drone and rocket attacks have hit Baghdad International Airport, which houses a military base and a US diplomatic facility, as well as oil fields and facilities.

On Monday night, two drones were downed near the military base, a security source told the AFP news agency.

The northern autonomous Kurdistan region, which hosts US troops, has been a main target of drone attacks, but these have been largely intercepted.

“All these attacks taking place overnight and early this morning highlight how increasingly Iraq is becoming a battleground in this widening” Middle East war, said Al Jazeera’s Assed Baig, reporting from Iraq’s Erbil.

Late on Monday, Kurdish counterterrorism forces said US-led coalition forces had “downed three explosive-laden drones over Erbil”, the capital of the Kurdistan region.

One drone fell near the UAE Consulate in Erbil, their statement added.

A Kurdish security source told AFP that the drone was likely aimed at the US Consulate but did not reach its target and fell instead near the Emirati mission.

In a statement on Tuesday, Kurdistan’s Regional Government said it “strongly condemns that brutal, unprovoked attack that targets civilians and cultural institutions, and aims to undermine diplomatic efforts, which completely violate international laws”.