Rockets target Baghdad's Green Zone, base housing U.S. troops

Edited by Ed Newman
2020-01-04 20:00:06

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Baghdad, January 4 (RHC)-- Several rockets fell inside Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone, its Jadriya neighborhood, and the Balad air base housing U.S. troops on Saturday, the Iraqi military said.

Two mortar rounds hit the Green Zone and two rockets slammed into a base housing U.S. troops, one day after a deadly U.S. strike killed Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani, top Iraqi paramilitary chief Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis and several other Iranian and Iraqi figures.  No casualties have been reported in any of the incidents.

The Green Zone is the high-security enclave where the US embassy is based.  Al Jazeera's Osama Bin Javaid, reporting from Baghdad, said none of the projectiles landed inside the U.S. embassy.  "According to Iraqi security forces, the projectiles landed in the celebration areas inside the Green Zone," he said.

A pair of Katyusha rockets then hit the Balad airbase north of Baghdad, where American troops are based, security sources and the Iraqi military said.  Security sources reported blaring sirens and said surveillance drones were sent above the base to locate the source of the rockets.

The U.S. embassy in Baghdad, as well as the 5,200 American troops stationed across the country, have faced a spate of rocket attacks in recent months that Washington has blamed on Iran and its allies in Iraq.



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