Attack on Iraq's Kurdish region as Iran denies pamphlet campaign

Aug 23, 2007, 16:21 GMT

Baghdad/Tehran - Iranian troops on Thursday fired artillery at several villages in Iraq's northern Kurdish region, a spokesman for Iraqi border troops said.

The attack east rSulaymanyah was carried out from the Iranian area and was felt some 10 kilometres inland, the spokesman said. The inhabitants of several villages fled in panic. There were no reports of injuries.

The Iranian government, meanwhile, reacted to earlier reports of a pamphlet campaign in the Kurdish region, reportedly aimed at stirring up panic in neighbouring Iraq.

Tehran denied reports of distributing pamphlets in the Kurdish villages that warned inhabitants of Iranian military operations in the area.

Spokesman for Iraqi border troops Jabar Yavar said he ruled out military operations conducted in Iraqi territory.

Tehran wants to avoid a conflict with the United States over Iraqi territory, which could provide a pretext for an attack on Iran.

Fears of an offensive by the Iranian Army grew in the autonomous Kurdish area after the pamphlets, allegedly originating from the Iranian Army, were distributed earlier in the week.

Local sources in northern Iraq had said the purported flyers, written in Kurdish, instructed civilians to relocate in order to avoid either ground or airborne military operations against anti- Iranian fighters from the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK).