TEHRAN: Three members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards were killed by unknown assailants on Tuesday in the country’s southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan.

According to the IRNA news agency, two cars belonging to Nikshahr county’s Basij (state-sanctioned volunteer militia) were attacked by the passengers of a Peugeot 405 while on the road.

A Guards’ member was wounded, it added, saying the identity of the assailants was under investigation.

Sistan-Baluchistan has long been a flashpoint where Jaish al Adl, a militant outfit, has in the past attacked and abducted Iranian security personnel.

In one incident, 27 guards died in a suicide attack targeting a bus in the province in February last year.

Jaish al Adl was formed in 2012 as a successor to the Sunni group Jundallah, which waged a deadly insurgency for a decade before it was severely weakened by the capture and execution of its leader Abdolmalek Rigi in 2010.

Published in Dawn, September 30th, 2020