Iran held a ceremony on Monday to mark the second anniversary of General Qasem Soleimani’s assassination at the Grand Mosalla mosque of Tehran.
Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the elite Quds Force in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), was assassinated by a U.S. drone strike in Iraq’s capital Baghdad on January 3, 2020.
A U.S. drone strike near Baghdad International Airport killed Soleimani and Iraqi commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. The assassination pushed Iran and the U.S. close to an all-out conflict and also sparked outrage in Iraq.
Iran on Sunday urged the United Nations Security Council to hold the U.S. and Israel accountable for Soleimani’s assassination.
Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi on Monday vowed revenge for Soleimani’s assassination unless former U.S. President Donald Trump is put on trial.
“If Trump and (former U.S. Secretary of State Mike) Pompeo are not tried in a fair court for the criminal act of assassinating General Soleimani, Muslims will take our martyr’s revenge,” Raisi said in a televised speech.
Two drones attacked a military base near Baghdad International Airport on Monday and were shot down, a security source said.
The attack, coinciding with the anniversary of Soleimani’s killing, took place at dawn when the drones attacked an Iraqi base known as Camp Victory housing some U.S. experts and agencies, but were shot down by the C-RAM defense system which protects the site, the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
Source » cgtn