Several members of Iran’s border guards were killed in a clash with what Tehran is calling a “terrorist” group in southeastern Iran on Saturday night.
According to reports, the border guards were located in Saravan near the shared border with Pakistan when they spotted a group of armed men, described in Iranian media to be “terrorists.” In the subsequent clashes between the Iranian guards and the armed men, five Iranian soldiers from the Saravan border regiment were killed.
Iran’s deputy police commander arrived at the border area and met with members of the border force following the incident.
The area bordering Pakistan is a contentious one, with it serving as a center for protests by the Baloch minority in Iran. Iran has been accused of massacring people in this area, particularly in Zahedan.
According to a report published by Iranian pro-government Mehr News, the armed men on the Pakistani side of the border fled during the clashes in which five Iranian guards were killed and another two seriously injured.
General view of a closed gate at Pakistan and Iran’s border posts, after Pakistan sealed its border with Iran as a preventive measure following the coronavirus outbreak, at the border post in Taftan, Pakistan February 25, 2020. (credit: REUTERS/NASEER AHMED)Similar incidents reported in the past
In December 2022, a similar incident occurred in which Iran reported that four border guards had also been killed in this area, and in April of this year, a local police chief was killed.
Another attack in Pakistan, this time around 700 km from the incident on the border with Iran, also took place over the last day. In the attack, the Baloch Liberation Army claimed to have killed nine Pakistani military personnel in a targeted attack of an outpost near Zarghoon and Margat. However, Pakistani media reported that just three soldiers had been killed.
Despite the timing of the two incidents, they are unlikely to be related, as both Pakistan and Iran have their own, separate conflicts with minorities in the Balochistan area on both sides of the border.
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