Attack on Iranian paramilitary base kills 1, wounds 5
Local prosecutor says member of elite Revolutionary Guards killed at Basij camp in the country’s south; jihadist group claims assault
TEHRAN, Iran — Two attackers scaled the wall of a Basij paramilitary base and opened fire Saturday, killing one member of Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and wounding five others in the southeastern town of Nikshahr, Iranian media reported.
Nikshahr prosecutor Mohsen Golmohammadi told the semi-official Mehr news agency the victim was a “member of the Guard” and identified him as Morteza Aliahmadi. He did not elaborate on Aliahmadi’s rank. The Basij is affiliated with the IRGC.
Golmohammadi said both attackers escaped.
The attack happened during the morning flag raising at the base, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
Nikshahr is located in Sistan-Baluchistan province. Last week, a double-bombing attack injured three policemen in Zahedan, the provincial capital. Baluch separatists and drug traffickers have claimed responsibility for past attacks.
The province has a large, mainly Sunni Muslim ethnic Baluchi community which straddles the border.
The jihadist Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice), which is blacklisted as a terrorist group by Iran, claimed responsibility for the raid on social media.
State media said only that it was a “terrorist” attack, and held no particular group responsible.
Jaish al-Adl was formed in 2012 as a successor to the Sunni extremist group Jundallah (Soldiers of God), which waged a deadly insurgency against Iranian targets over the previous decade.
It also claimed responsibility for two bombings on Wednesday which wounded several police officers in the provincial capital Zahedan.
In December, a suicide car bomber struck a police headquarters in the port city of Chabahar, killing at least two police and wounding 42 others.
