ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq’s outgoing Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani on Tuesday approved financial disbursements for families of casualties affected by military attacks linked to the six-week Iran war in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, the council of ministers said in a statement.
Days earlier, Erbil had reported that 20 people had been killed and more than 120 others injured in over 800 attacks on the Region since the outbreak of the war in late February through mid-April.
Sudani on Tuesday chaired a cabinet meeting to discuss the overall situation in the country, “approving the allocation of a financial sum to be disbursed as entitlements to the families of martyrs and the wounded from recent military attacks on Iraqi territory, including victims in the Kurdistan Region,” the statement said.
The United States and Israel launched a wide-scale aerial campaign against Iran on February 28, targeting more than 17,000 sites across the country over six weeks of hostilities.
In response, Tehran carried out drone and missile strikes across the Middle East, targeting alleged US assets - particularly in Gulf Arab states - as well as launching retaliatory attacks against Israel.
The Iranian response has also involved Iraqi armed groups aligned with the Tehran-led ‘Axis of Resistance,’ with several factions claiming responsibility for attacks on purported US targets in the region, including in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.
The Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Department of Media and Information reported on Saturday that the attacks on the Region since the outbreak of the Iran war and through April 20 “resulted in 20 martyrs and 123 wounded, while hundreds of citizens suffered material losses affecting their homes, workplaces, and vehicles.”
It added that Erbil province alone recorded 477 incidents, including 419 drone attacks and 58 missile strikes, while Sulaimani province endured 235 attacks, Duhok 29, and Soran district northeast of Erbil 68, bringing the total to 809 attacks.
Erbil’s Media Department added that “since the outbreak of the war, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has consistently condemned these attacks,” reiterating that “the Federal Government in Baghdad has repeatedly been urged to identify, prosecute, and hold accountable the perpetrators of these terrorist acts and to take the necessary measures to bring an end to these unlawful assaults.”
The US and Iran on April 8 agreed to a Pakistan-mediated ceasefire, halting fighting to allow space for talks. While the first round of discussions ended without a final agreement on April 11, Islamabad has in recent weeks intensified efforts to facilitate a second round of talks between American and Iranian negotiators, though these efforts have yet to yield tangible results.
Despite the truce between the warring parties holding, the Kurdistan Region has since then and until Friday endured “a further 48 attacks,” according to a report by the Community Peacemaker Teams (CPT), a prominent human rights watchdog based in the Region.