ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The recent attacks against the Kurdistan Region were not launched from Nineveh province, a member of the provincial council's security and defense committee said Wednesday, while a lawmaker from the province contends that the strikes were launched from a district southwest of the province.
"No attack on the Kurdistan Region was launched from within Nineveh province," Mohammed Kakayi, from the provincial council's security and defense committee, told Rudaw's Nahro Mohammed following a meeting of the committee.
He said military and security commanders have "conducted a thorough investigation into the matter" before "reaffirming" the outcome.
Meanwhile, Sherwan Dubardani, a member of the Iraqi parliament's defense committee who represents Nineveh, said the recent drone attacks "were launched against the Kurdistan Region from behind the al-Hadar district in the Nineveh province."
On Monday, Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said during a press conference that "of the drones that targeted Erbil once again came from within Iraq itself, from the direction of Mosul."
Barzani held Baghdad "responsible for stopping the sources of these risks and threats against the Region."
Kurdistan Region Interior Minister Reber Ahmed has accused Baghdad of failing to take any steps to stop the attacks.
The Kurdistan Region has largely stayed on the sidelines of the wider US-Iran conflict since February 28, when war broke out following a joint US-Israeli attack on Iran. Since then, Iran and its aligned groups in Iraq have carried out frequent drone and missile strikes against the Region, claiming to target US assets as well as Kurdish dissident groups.
Based on Rudaw's tracking, the attacks have claimed 32 lives and injured around 150 others since the outbreak of the war.
The Iraqi state-sponsored Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) operate at least a dozen major brigades and regiments in Nineveh.
Comprising various armed groups, the Iran-backed "Islamic Resistance of Iraq" (IRI) — whose factions overlap with the PMF — is primarily accused of orchestrating the strikes.
