Army officials said on Sunday that the Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi escaped an armed drone assassination attempt in Baghdad unharmed, in an incident that heightened tensions in Iraq only weeks after a general election contested by Iran-backed militia groups.
In a video released by his office on Sunday, Kadhimi was seen chairing a meeting with top security commanders to discuss the drone attack.
‘Last night’s cowardly terrorist attack on the prime minister’s home with the intention of assassinating him is a serious targeting of the Iraqi state by criminal armed groups,’ his office said after the meeting.
Security sources told Reuters that six of Kadhimi’s guards were injured outside his residence in the fortified Green Zone.
An interior ministry spokesperson told state news agency INA that three drones were used in the attack, two of which were shot down by security forces and a third which hit the residence.
The security situation in the Green Zone, which houses the residence, government buildings and foreign embassies, was stable after the attack, a spokesperson for the armed forces commander in chief told the media.
The attack was condemned by the United Nations, the United States, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
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