As Iran struggles to contain a wave of street protests at home, the regime launched a drone and missile attack on an Iranian-Kurdish opposition group in neighboring Iraq on Wednesday, Kurdish and U.S. officials said.
The Iranian attack left at least nine dead and 32 wounded, Kurdish authorities said.
It was the latest in a series of attacks by Iran against Iraq's Kurdistan region in the past several days, as Tehran has claimed Kurdish groups have been helping to fuel the demonstrations that have swept across Iran for more than a week.
The mass protests in Iran erupted after a 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini, died in police custody after being detained by the country s morality police for allegedly violating the government s requirement to cover their hair and shape of their bodies. The protests, the most serious challenge to the regime since 2009, have been marked by unprecedented defiance by Iranian women who have removed or sometimes burned their headscarves in front of large crowds, or cut their hair.
The U.S. condemned the Iranian attack as an attack on Iraq's sovereignty and accused the regime of trying to divert attention from domestic turmoil.
Jake Sullivan, White House national security adviser, said that Iran could not deny blame for its internal problems and the legitimate grievances of its population with attacks across its borders.
The Biden administration also threatened to impose more sanctions against Iran to counter Tehran's actions in the region.
The United States will continue to pursue sanctions and other means to disrupt Iran's destabilizing activities in the Middle East, Sullivan said.
The U.S. military shot down a Iranian drone that posed a threat to American forces deployed near Erbil in northern Iraq, according to U.S. Central Command CENTCOM, which oversees U.S. troops in the Middle East. No U.S. troops were killed or wounded in the Iranian attack.
At around 2: 10 PM local time, the U.S. forces brought down an Iranian Mojer 6 Unmanned Aerial Vehicle headed for Erbil, as it appeared to be a threat to USCENTCOM forces in the area, the command said in a statement.
Iraq's foreign ministry said that 20 drones, artillery and rockets were used in the attack.
The foreign ministry said that such unilateral and provocative actions will only contribute to more tension and the security scene will be hampered by these unilateral and provocative actions.
The Iranian government s IRNA news agency said that the Revolutionary Guard Corps struck bases of a separatist group in Iraq with precision missiles and suicide drones. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees said it was gravely concerned about today s attack, which impacted the Iranian refugee settlements in Koya and cited reports of civilian casualties, including women and children and refugees.
Iran has carried out cross-border attacks against Kurdish groups in Iraq.