Clashes in southeast Iran kill five border guards

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Five Iranian border guards were killed early Sunday during clashes with an armed group in Iran’s southeastern Sistan and Baluchestan province, local media reported, adding that two other guards are in critical condition. 

The clashes “with armed criminals” broke out near the city of Saravan in southeast Iran “and martyred 5 border guards,” the semi-official Mehr News Agency said. The armed group was engaged while attempting to “infiltrate” the country but fled the scene following the clashes. 

While the armed group’s allegiance was not specified, a number of Balochi jihadist groups in southeast Iran, primarily the Jaish al-Adl (Justice Army), have waged an insurgency against the Islamic republic and carried out attacks against its forces, especially the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). 

In 2021, an attack by the group in Saravan killed at least five guards of the IRGC and three others were taken prisoner.

Jaish al-Adl has carried out a number of suicide attacks on Iranian security forces, killing dozens in the border areas. The group was added to the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations in 2019 by the administration of former US president Donald Trump.

The designation was in response to a deadly attack by the group on the IRGC, which killed 27 guards near Sistan and Baluchestan’s provincial capital of Zahedan.