(Reuters) - A U.S. soldier on overnight guard duty at a base in Iraq was wounded this week when an attacker opened fire at his position, the first direct-fire casualty since U.S. forces began a mission to train Iraqi troops last year, the Pentagon said on Friday.
The soldier was cut on the nose by a bullet or a ricochet while looking over a concrete barricade trying to locate the source of a light observed by a fellow soldier in a guard tower, said Army Colonel Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman.
The shot resulted in an exchange of gunfire. There were no other injuries. The soldier was treated at the site following the incident and carried on with the guard duty, Warren said.
The incident took place about 3 a.m. on March 11 at the Iraqi base at Besmaya, one of several sites where U.S. troops are training Iraqi security forces. Warren said about 100 military trainers were working at Besmaya, guarded by an additional force of U.S. soldiers.
Warren said the solder was the first U.S. service member wounded in direct-fire incident at an Iraqi base since American forces began training security forces last year to help them in their fight against Islamic State rebels.
The bases have occasionally come under direct or indirect fire, but the attacks have largely been ineffective.
Five members of the U.S.-led coalition have been killed in operations against Islamic State so far, military officials said.
Two U.S. Marines died in accidents and a U.S. Air Force pilot was killed in a plane crash in Jordan. A Jordanian pilot was captured and burned to death by rebels and a Canadian special forces soldier was killed in a friendly fire incident.
Three Canadian soldiers also were wounded in the friendly fire incident in Iraq earlier this month.
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