Iran: IRGC brigadier general among three killed in Sistan-Baluchestan clashes
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps says a raid on an armed group it accused of plotting an assassination in Saravan turned into a deadly firefight. Eleven days later, gunfire broke out again in the same area.
RastinewsThree members of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), including a commander, were killed in a clash with an armed group in the southeastern province of Sistan and Baluchestan.
IRGC-affiliated media said the fighting broke out on September 12 in the city of Saravan, during an operation against a group Iranian authorities accused of preparing an assassination.
The IRGC identified the slain commander as Brigadier General Hossein Zarifi, head of the Saravan Sajjad Operational Base.
"Acting with US and Israeli backing"
The IRGC's Quds Force said in a statement that four members of the armed group were also killed in the clash, and that weapons, ammunition and explosives were seized from a hideout.
The IRGC alleged the gunmen were acting with US and Israeli support and were planning an attack in Sistan and Baluchestan. Iranian authorities offered no independent evidence linking the group to any specific organization.
Fresh clash in Saravan
Iranian forces clashed again with unidentified gunmen on September 23 in the Jihadabad area of Saravan.
Iranian state media reported that three members of the armed group were killed in the fighting. Human rights monitors said heavy gunfire was heard in the area and that additional security forces, including helicopters, were deployed there.
The identities of those involved in the clash and the group they belonged to remain unclear.
Earlier operation in Zahedan
Earlier in September, the IRGC said it had killed two people it identified as members of Jaish al-Adl in a separate operation in the city of Zahedan, and captured a third.
Sistan and Baluchestan, on the border with Pakistan and Afghanistan, is majority Sunni Baluch. The province has long been the site of attacks by armed Baluch groups and clashes with Iranian security forces.
Jaish al-Adl, which operates in the region, has carried out attacks on Iranian security forces and state institutions. Tehran designates the group a "terrorist organization," while it says it is fighting for expanded rights for Baluchs in Iran.
Armed insurgency, sectarian tension and cross-border smuggling are cited as key factors behind the province's long-running instability.