TEHRAN (Tasnim) Three armed bandits were killed and the same number wounded and arrested in a surprise raid by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) forces in southeast Iran Monday night after armed men abducted two people.The Public Relations of Qods Force of the IRGC reported on Tuesday morning that the surprise operation by the officers of that force was launched after two Iranian citizens were taken hostage by the armed bandits in Iranshahr region of Sistan and Balouchestan province.
In the surprise operation launched after the hostage taking, the two hostages were freed, three of the armed bandits were killed and three more of them wounded, said the Qods Force Public Relations office.
On November 17, Iran's interior minister said precise and serious border control in the southeastern province of Sistan and Balouchestan is of utmost importance, adding that in the next six months those parts of the border which are still not sealed will be blocked to illegal crossings.
Serious and precise protection of Sistan and Balouchestan borders is on the agenda and it will take six months from now to seal the yet unblocked parts of our borders and to control them, especially in Saravan region, Interior Minister Abdol Reza Rahmani Fazli said in Zabol.
Iran's border police commander, too, said on November 16 that some $30 million has been allocated for the security and sealing of borders in the southeastern province of Sistan and Balouchestan, that adjoins both Pakistan and Afghanistan, by the end of the Iranian calendar year.
The amount is 40% of the total budget allocated to the border guards for the whole year, said Brigadier General Hossein Zolfaqari.
On Friday, October 25, a group of armed men carried out an ambush attack on a border post in Gazbostan, near Irans southeastern city of Saravan, on the border with Pakistan which has almost no control over its side of the shared frontier with Iran, killing 14 Iranian border guards.
In October, commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps said that his forces had been able to foil as many as 11 terrorist attack plots "hatched by hostile and opposition groups" in southeast Iran in six months.
By Tasnim News Agency
The Iran Project is not responsible for the content of quoted articles.
