A series of mortars or rockets slammed into the US-controlled Green Zone yesterday, and an official said at least one round struck a parking lot used by the Iraqi prime minister and his security detail.
The barrage occurred a day after the US military acknowledged "an increasing pattern of attacks" against the sprawling complex on the west bank of the Tigris River despite a security crackdown now in its fifth month.
A plume of black smoke billowed into the sky and helicopters buzzed overhead after about nine blasts occurred in quick succession around 10am.
At least one mortar round struck a parking lot used by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his security detail, an official from the prime minister's office said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information.
The US embassy confirmed there were rounds of indirect fire, the military term for rockets or mortars, but said it could not immediately provide details such as where they struck.
A recent increase in mortar and rocket attacks on the Green Zone, which houses the US embassy and major Iraqi government offices, has raised new concern about the security of thousands of US soldiers and foreign contractors, as well Iraqis.
It was unclear whether the rounds were fired by Sunni or Shiite extremists. Both groups operate in areas of the city within rocket and mortar range of the heavily fortified complex of concrete buildings and checkpoints.
Mortar and rocket crews can set up their weapons quickly on the beds of trucks or in parts of the city with limited surveillance, fire their rounds and flee before US and Iraqi forces can respond.
A June 5 UN report said insurgents had bombarded the Green Zone with rockets and mortar fire more than 80 times since March, reportedly killing at least 26 people.
Rear Admiral Mark Fox, a US military spokesman in Baghdad, declined to provide details on the number of attacks against the Green Zone, which is also known as the International Zone, but said they were increasing.
"It's clear that there is an attempt to get lucky shots, and there is unquestionably an increasing pattern of attacks here against the International Zone. There's no doubt about that," Fox said on Wednesday at a joint news conference with Iraqi military spokesman Qassim al-Moussawi.
Al-Moussawi said the attacks were coming from inside residential areas, causing difficulties in responding to them because of concern about civilian casualties.
At least 12 people were killed yesterday when a suicide bomber exploded an oil tanker outside police headquarters in a northern Iraqi town, police and hospital officials said.
Another 70 people were wounded in the attack, including several members of the local government and police, according to an official in the hospital of a neighboring town that was receiving victims.
The explosion took place in the town of Suleiman Beg, about 90km south of the city of Kirkuk, by a cluster of government buildings including the police headquarters.
"Several of the wounded are city council members and police officers, including the chief of police in Suleiman Beg, Hassan Ali Al-Bayati," the hospital official said.
The attack gutted the police headquarters and two local administration buildings and fires raged near the crater of the explosion, a local police official said.
"Rescue efforts are still going on and they are still trying to put out the fires," said Colonel Abbas Mohammed Amin, a police chief in the neighbouing town of Tuz Khurmatu.
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion
UNDER INVESTIGATION: Members of the local Muslim community had raised concerns with the police about the boy, who officials said might have been radicalized online A 16-year-old boy armed with a knife was shot dead by police after he stabbed a man in the Australian west coast city of Perth, officials said yesterday. The incident occurred in the parking lot of a hardware store in suburban Willetton on Saturday night. The teen attacked the man and then rushed at police officers before he was shot, Western Australian Premier Roger Cook told reporters. “There are indications he had been radicalized online,” Cook told a news conference, adding that it appeared he acted alone. A man in his 30s was found at the scene with a stab wound to his back.