Five members of Iran's security forces were killed in an attack on a post in Sistan and Baluchistan province. This is another such attack on officers in this region. Iran has been conducting operations there against rebel groups for several days.
According to the Fars news agency, the attack took place on Sunday in the south-eastern province of Sistan and Baluchistan, bordering on Pakistan.
The attackers attacked a guard tower near the Iran-Pakistan border, and the victims were members of the Basij forces, a mass volunteer paramilitary organization that is part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. As the provincial governor said in an interview with state television, the attackers were neither Baluch nor Sunni, but came from a neighboring country.
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“After the incident, units stationed in the region were quickly dispatched to pursue the criminals,” Fars reported.
This region, one of the poorest in Iran, is inhabited by the Baloch ethnic minority, which, unlike the Shia branch that dominates the country, practices Sunni Islam. The Baloch are an ethnic minority living in Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. They demand greater autonomy and, over time, full independence.
More victims of attacks
In the last days of October, ten police officers were killed in this region in an attack claimed by the Sunni jihadist group Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice in Arabic). According to local media, Iranian forces have since launched a major operation during which 15 people were killed, including the organizer of the attack.
Jaish al-Adl, established 12 years ago, is one of the Baluch separatist groups. A group considered terrorist by several countries is fighting for an independent Balochistan. Its leader spoke out against Iran's support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the country's civil war. In recent years, the group has carried out several attacks on security officials and policemen in Iran.
In mid-January, Iran fired at the group's headquarters in Pakistan, which led to a diplomatic tension between Islamabad and Tehran. Pakistan recalled its ambassador from Tehran and two days later retaliated by also carrying out airstrikes against the group – this time within Iran. It was an unprecedented crisis in the forty-year history of both Islamic republics, said the Iran International website. Both countries have repeatedly accused each other of allowing rebel groups to operate from their territories to carry out attacks on their neighbors' territory.
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