ACCORDING to global news agencies, Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC); Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis (head of Kataib Hezbollah) and the second-in-command of Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces; as well as a number of Iranian, Iraqi and Lebanese nationals in the same convoy, were killed in an air strike near to Baghdad airport. 

The assassination of Soleimani, on the order of US President Donald Trump, in clear violation of Iraqi national sovereignty and all international law, could undoubtedly pose deadly risks for the region.

Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of the regime in Iran, issued a message in wake of the incident, which announced three days of public mourning in the country and read: “A harsh revenge awaits the criminals whose dirty hands are tainted with his [Soleimani’s] blood and the blood of other martyrs of last night’s incident.”