Two convoys of the US-led coalition against ISIL were targeted by a roadside bomb in southern Iraq today (Sunday). One of these attacks took place in al-Samawah province and the al-Samawah road to Baghdad, and the other in Diwaniyah province.
At least two explosions have hit convoys supplying U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq in the last 24 hours, security sources said, the first on Monday evening near the southern border with Kuwait and the second on Tuesday north of Baghdad.
The explosions, which caused no casualties but did some material damage, are the latest in a string of such incidents in recent weeks. An attack in southern Iraq on Sunday hit a convoy carrying supplies to coalition forces, the military said.
Several thousand U.S. forces are still based in Iraq, leading a coalition whose mission is to fight Sunni Muslim Islamic State militants.
Those forces are also a target for Iran-backed Shi’ite militias, which the United States blames for regular rocket attacks on bases hosting the coalition, and on other U.S. targets such as Washington’s embassy in Baghdad.
The militias have vowed to avenge the death of paramilitary commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who was killed alongside Iranian military mastermind Qassem Soleimani in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January. Political forces aligned with the militias demand a full withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq.
They also oppose Iraq’s Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, who took office in May. He is viewed as being friendly with the United States and has challenged the power of Iran-aligned armed groups in Iraq.
Kadhimi is struggling to make good on pledges to ensure Iraq does not become a theatre for power and resources struggles between foreign countries including the United States, Iran, and other regional powers.
In a separate incident in northeastern Iraq on Tuesday, a Turkish airstrike – part of Ankara’s latest campaign against Kurdish separatist militants based in the northern, Kurdish part of Iraq – killed three members of Iraq’s border guard, the Iraqi military said in a statement.
