Rockets target north Iraq oil refinery, cause ‘minor damage’

Six rockets landed Sunday in northern Iraq’s independent Kurdistan region, Kurdish counter-terrorism forces said, with “minor damage” pronounced at a key oil refinery, in step with a separate protection source.

“Six rockets fell near the Zab river within the Khabat district,” Kurdish counter-terrorism forces said in an announcement, without specifying the goal of the attack.

The attack caused no casualties or damage, the statement said.

But two sources speaking on condition of anonymity said that two rockets hit part of the Kawergosk refinery northwest of the Kurdish capital Arbil, causing “minor material damage”.

A fire broke out at the site but was “quickly contained”, one of the sources said.

The rocket attack was not immediately claimed.

The Kurdish counter-terrorism forces said the rockets were fired from the town of Bartella in neighboring Nineveh province.

Nineveh falls under the administration of the federal government in Baghdad. Its capital Mosul was once the stronghold of the Islamic State jihadist group before it was retaken by pro-government forces in 2017.

In early April, three rockets landed at Kawergosk, with no casualties or material damage reported.

The April rocket fireplace got here much less than a month after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards — the Islamic republic’s ideological military — claimed ballistic missile fire on Arbil that it stated targeted an Israeli “strategic middle”.

Kurdish authorities have insisted the Jewish state has no sites in or near Arbil.