Fatal Iran clash adds to tensions over protesters

An attack by armed separatists on a police station in a southeastern city killed 19 people, including four members of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the state-run IRNA news agency reported Saturday.

The assailants in Friday’s attack hid among worshipers near a mosque in the city of Zahedan and attacked the nearby police station, according to the report.

IRNA quoted Hossein Modaresi, the provincial governor, as saying 19 people were killed. The outlet said 32 Guard members, including volunteer Basiji forces, were also wounded in the violence.

It was not immediately clear if the attack was related to nationwide antigovernment protests gripping Iran after the death in police custody of a young Iranian woman.

Sistan and Baluchestan province borders Afghanistan and Pakistan and has seen previous attacks on security forces by ethnic Baluchi separatists.

Tasnim and other statelinked Iranian news outlets reported that the head of the Guard’s intelligence department, Seyyed Ali Mousavi, was shot during the attack and later died.

The Guard’s chief, Gen. Hossein Salami vowed that they will avenge the killings. “We consider revenge for the blood of the IRGC and Basiji martyrs and the people who were victims of the Black Friday crime in Zahedan to be on our agenda,” IRNA reported.

Thousands of Iranians have taken to the streets over the last two weeks to protest the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who had been detained by morality officers in the capital of Tehran for allegedly wearing her mandatory Islamic headscarf too loosely.

The protesters have vented their anger over the treatment of women and wider repression in the Islamic Republic. The nationwide demonstrations rapidly escalated into calls for the overthrow of the clerical establishment that has ruled Iran since its 1979 Islamic revolution. Iranian state TV has reported that at least 41 protesters and police have been killed since the demonstrations began Sept. 17.

Witnesses said scattered protests involving dozens of demonstrators took place Saturday in Tehran. Riot police dispersed the protesters, who chanted “death to dictator.” Some witnesses said police fired tear gas.

Alessandra Tarantino / Associated Press Demonstrators rally in Rome to protest the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who had been detained by Iranian morality police for wearing her Islamic headscarf too loosely.