WASHINGTON, Dec 26: US and British aircraft on Thursday attacked a military communications facility in southern Iraq to retaliate for the downing of an unmanned US spy plane earlier this week.

The US Central Command said the attack with precision-guided weapons came early in the morning on the facility near Tallil, about 280kms southeast of Baghdad.

The attack was in retaliation for Monday’s downing of the Predator spy drone by Iraqi anti-aircraft fire and warplanes, which entered the “no-fly” zone over the southern part of the country, the command said in a statement.

“Coalition strikes in the no-fly zones are executed as a self-defence measure in response to Iraqi hostile threats and acts against coalition forces and their aircraft,” the statement said.

In Baghdad, the official news agency said three Iraqis were killed and 16 wounded in the strike.

“Enemy warplanes bombed civilian installations in the provinces of Basra and Zi-Qar and three Iraqi civilians were killed and sixteen others wounded in the attacks,” a military spokesman told the agency.

The air-exclusion zones over northern and southern Iraq set up after the 1990-1991 war are enforced by US and British air patrols. Airstrikes against Iraqi defences that fire on the patrols are common.

Baghdad has long opposed the zones, which are not sanctioned by any specific UN resolution, and insists it will defend its airspace against incursions.

In recent weeks, the air patrols have resulted in almost daily clashes with Iraqi defences on the ground as Washington and London step up enforcement of the zones as preparation for a possible US-led invasion. Air-to-air encounters are rare, however.

Coalition aircraft have dropped hundreds of thousands of leaflets warning Iraqi troops not to resist efforts to enforce the zones.—AFP