US and Saudi warplanes carried out strikes against “Iran-aligned terrorists” in Iraq who launched more than two dozen drone attacks in recent days, the US military said.

The strikes targeted “Iran-aligned terrorists that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) directed to attack US forces and Saudi energy infrastructure,” US Central Command (Centcom) said in a statement.

It further warned that “the IRGC and its terrorist proxies must cease these attacks to avoid further US military response”.

Saudi Arabia confirmed its involvement in the strikes, with its defence ministry saying it hit “targets belonging to those militias present on Iraqi territory that are linked to attacks on the kingdom’s oil facilities”.