The US has carried out strikes in Iraq against three facilities linked to Iran-backed militia, the Pentagon has said, after a weekend attack on an Iraqi airbase that wounded US forces.

“US military forces conducted necessary and proportionate strikes on three facilities used by the Iranian-backed Kataib Hezbollah militia group and other Iran-affiliated groups in Iraq,” the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said in a statement.

“These precision strikes are in direct response to a series of escalatory attacks against US and Coalition personnel in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-sponsored militias,” Austin added.

On Saturday, four US personnel suffered traumatic brain injuries after Iraq’s Ain al-Asad airbase was hit by multiple ballistic missiles and rockets fired by Iranian-backed militants from inside Iraq.

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