Six Killed in Attack on Small Airport in Iraq’s Kurdistan 

The premises of an airfield used by Iraqi Kurdish forces is pictured in Arbat, near Sulaymaniyah in Iraq's Kurdistan, after a drone strike that hit the airfield. (AFP)
The premises of an airfield used by Iraqi Kurdish forces is pictured in Arbat, near Sulaymaniyah in Iraq's Kurdistan, after a drone strike that hit the airfield. (AFP)
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Six Killed in Attack on Small Airport in Iraq’s Kurdistan 

The premises of an airfield used by Iraqi Kurdish forces is pictured in Arbat, near Sulaymaniyah in Iraq's Kurdistan, after a drone strike that hit the airfield. (AFP)
The premises of an airfield used by Iraqi Kurdish forces is pictured in Arbat, near Sulaymaniyah in Iraq's Kurdistan, after a drone strike that hit the airfield. (AFP)

Six people were killed on Monday in a drone strike on the small military airport of Arbid in Iraq’s Kurdistan region, a local official and a security source told Reuters.

Iraqi Kurdish security forces sealed off the area, according to two security sources.

Arbid is a small airport used for helicopters located 50 km (30 miles) to the east of the city of Sulaymaniyah in the northeast of the country.

Two members of the Kurdish security forces were wounded in the attack and were rushed to a military hospital in Sulaymaniyah under tight security, said the police source.

Police said the identities of the deceased were still unknown.

One security source said initial information suggested a Turkish drone was used in the attack against a suspected Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) target.

Türkiye regularly carries out air strikes on PKK militants in northern Iraq and has dozens of outposts in Iraqi territory. The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984.

Bafel Talabani, President of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), one of the dominant Kurdish parties in northern Iraq, confirmed the drone strike but said the six dead and wounded were members of the Iraqi Kurdish counter-terrorism force.

“We strongly condemn the terrorist attack on the Agricultural Airport of Arbid in Sulaymaniyah, which resulted in the martyrdom and injury of six heroic Peshmerga ...,” he said in a statement.

Iraqi Kurdistan’s internal security forces, Asayish, said in a statement the counter-terrorism force was attacked and three members were killed during a training mission inside the “agricultural airport.”

Iraqi Kurdistan’s Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani condemned the drone attack and demanded the intervention of the federal government authorities to “prevent these attacks from recurring.”

Two Iraqi army intelligence officers said Baghdad will send a joint security team to Sulaymaniyah to investigate the strike.

Also on Monday, the Kurdistan National Congress, an umbrella organization of Kurdish groups and parties, said in a statement that one of its members was “assassinated” inside the group’s office in the capital of the Kurdistan Region, Erbil, without giving further details.

Türkiye often launches strikes against targets in Syria and Iraq that it believes to be affiliated to the PKK.

In April, Türkiye closed its airspace to flights to and from the Sulaymaniyah International Airport, citing an alleged increase in Kurdish militant activity threatening flight safety.

Days later, the Syrian Democratic Forces — Kurdish-led forces operating in northeast Syria that are allied to the United States in its fight against the ISIS but considered by Türkiye to be an offshoot of the PKK — accused Türkiye of launching a strike on the airport when SDF commander Mazloum Abdi was at the site. Abdi was unharmed.



Italy’s PM in Beirut, Says Europe Wants a ‘Sustainable Ceasefire’ in Gaza and Lebanon

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati (R) shakes hands with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (L) following a joint press conference at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, 18 October 2024. (EPA)
Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati (R) shakes hands with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (L) following a joint press conference at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, 18 October 2024. (EPA)
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Italy’s PM in Beirut, Says Europe Wants a ‘Sustainable Ceasefire’ in Gaza and Lebanon

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati (R) shakes hands with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (L) following a joint press conference at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, 18 October 2024. (EPA)
Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati (R) shakes hands with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (L) following a joint press conference at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, 18 October 2024. (EPA)

Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said European countries are working for a “sustainable ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.

Speaking in Beirut after meeting Friday with her Lebanese counterpart, Najib Mikati, Meloni said European nations also support negotiations for the release of Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza since October last year.

Mikati said “a diplomatic solution should overcome” war that has intensified in recent weeks into an Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon, and that Israel must agree to a ceasefire.

Meloni added that targeting UN peacekeepers deployed along the Lebanon-Israel border is unacceptable and that both sides must “ensure at all times the safety of each of these soldiers.” She stressed that the peacekeepers will be needed in any post-conflict scenario.

Over the past two weeks, UN posts along the border have been subjected to fire that that has wounded at least five peacekeepers.

Meloni said the peacekeeping force in south Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, must be strengthened and that UNIFIL and Lebanese troops should be the only armed forces in the area south of the Litani river along the border with Israel.

According to a 2006 UN Security Council resolution that ended the 34-day Israel-Hezbollah war in 2006, Hezbollah should have no presence in the area along the border with Israel.