Every effort must be made to avoid Iraq being sucked up into an escalation of the Middle East war, French President Emmanuel Macron said Saturday after speaking with the head of the country's autonomous Kurdistan region.Macron posted his message on X after a deadly strike in northern Iraq against the former paramilitary group the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF).
"Everything must be done to avoid Iraq being drawn into the current escalation," he said.
The PMF -- now part of Iraq's army but which includes some pro-Iran factions -- said three of its fighters were killed in what it described as a US-Israeli attack.
Macron said he had told the Iraqi Kurdistan region's President Nechirvan Barzani that he also viewed as "unacceptable" a drone attack against his official residence earlier Saturday.
"This very worrying development adds to a rise in attacks against Iraqi institutions, like those that left six eshmergas dead this week," he said, referring to members of Kurdistan's armed forces who were killed in an Iranian missile strike Tuesday.
Iran's government fears armed Kurdish groups in northern Iraq could be sent in through its own Kurdish region, which is in the west, on the border with Iraq.
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