An Iraqi fighter was killed Saturday in airstrikes on military bases belonging to the former paramilitary coalition Hashed al-Shaabi in the country's north, authorities said.The government's security media cell said that "at 18:10 (1510 GMT), unidentified aircraft struck the 40th brigade of the Hashed al-Shaabi", or the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), and that a second strike hit another base in the northern Nineveh province.
One fighter was killed and three others wounded, the media cell said, without specifying in which of the strikes.
Earlier, a PMF official told AFP that "an airstrike, likely American, hit a Hashed base" housing the 40th brigade south of the city of Mosul, and later said that there were casualties.
The Hashed al-Shaabi is an alliance of factions now integrated into the regular army.
Bases belonging to Hashed have been hit several times since the start of the war in the Middle East, with strikes hitting Tehran-backed armed groups.
Pro-Iran factions have brigades that operate within the Hashed al-Shaabi, but have a reputation for acting on their own.
They are also part of the loose alliance of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq that has vowed not to stay neutral in the war and has been claiming attacks against US bases in Iraq and the region.
Iraq, long a proxy battleground between the US and Iran, had said it did not want to be dragged into the conflict engulfing the Middle East, but it has not been spared.
It was drawn into the war from the outset, with strikes blamed on the United States and Israel targeting Iran-backed groups.
