A military base in Iraq housing a pro-Iranian militia was damaged by an explosion, killing one person and wounding eight, security officials there said.
The Iraqi military said there were no drones or fighter jets in the area before or during the blast, and the US said it was not involved.
Meanwhile, the militia, the Popular Mobilization Forces, blamed an attack.
It comes amid heightened tensions between Israel and Iran.
The long-running confrontation between the rival countries has entered a new phase, with a suspected Israeli attack carried out early Friday morning near the Iranian city of Isfahan.
The attack was an apparent response to a major drone and missile attack that Tehran launched against Israel six days earlier.
The Iranian action was in retaliation for an earlier attack on senior Iranian military commanders in the Syrian capital Damascus, widely believed to have been carried out by Israel.
While the conflict appears to be under control to some extent for now, Iran’s foreign minister has warned that Iran will mount a “maximum” response if Israel launches significant attacks on its interests.
The explosion at the Kasso military base, about 30 miles (50 km) south of Baghdad, occurred early Saturday morning, the military said.
It was used by the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a paramilitary dominated by Iranian-backed Shia Muslim militias.
A PMF member was killed in the blast and eight others were injured.
In a statement, the PMF said its chief of staff, Abdul Aziz al-Mohammedawi, had visited the base to assess what investigators had found so far.
The Iraqi military also said it was investigating the cause of the explosion and fire at the base.
“The air defense command report confirmed, through technical efforts and radar detection, that there was no drone or fighter jet in Babil airspace before and during the explosion,” a statement said.
The US military’s Central Command denied in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that there were reports that the US had carried out air strikes in Iraq.
