BAGHDAD/WASHINGTON, June 20: Iraq said four people were killed on Thursday when Western warplanes launched a raid in the south of the country. The US military said the attack was prompted by Iraqi anti-aircraft fire at jets policing a “no-fly” zone.

A statement released by the US military’s Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Florida, said the planes attacked an Iraqi military command-and-control centre in a “no-fly” zone southeast of Baghdad.

It was the second day in a row that US or British attack jets struck no-fly zones in northern or southern Iraq in an increasing round of such exchanges in recent months. The coalition jets have been patrolling the zones, which Iraq does not recognize, since the 1991 war.

The US statement said the command facility, located about 265kms southeast of the capital, was attacked with precision-guided weapons.

Damage was still being assessed and all aircraft departed the zone safely, it added.

“This facility was struck because it helped direct anti-aircraft artillery attacks against coalition aircraft authorized by the United Nations Security Council” to enforce the zones, the statement said of the strike.

An Iraqi military spokesman said in a statement carried by the official Iraqi News Agency (INA): “At 11:05am (1.05pm PST) today US and British planes carried out 44 sorties from bases in Kuwait, flying over Nasiriya, Shatra, Basra, Qurna, Amarah, Salman...

“Hostile planes attacked our service and civilian installations in Meisan province, killing four people and wounding 10 others,” the spokesman added.

The US European Command said on Wednesday from its headquarters in Germany that US and British warplanes were targeted by anti-aircraft guns in the northern no-fly zone and struck air defence targets in response. —Reuters