In a brazen attack on Iran's military elite, a suicide bomber today killed five Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders and 26 others at a gathering of tribal leaders in a southeastern province near the Pakistan border that's known for drug running and religious extremism, according to the official Iranian news agency.
The assault was carried out by a lone man who reportedly disguised himself in tribal dress and detonated an explosives belt at a gymnasium in the city of Pisheen in the Sistan-Baluchistan province, a harsh land plagued by heroin smuggling and ethnic animosities. At least 28 people were wounded in the carnage, images of which were broadcast across a stunned nation.
Iran state-owned Press TV reported that a simultaneous second bombing targeted another group of Revolutionary Guard officers traveling in a convoy near Pisheen. There were no numbers on casualties, and the report could not be independently confirmed.
State media said the Sunni Muslim militant group Jundallah, or Soldiers of God, which operates along the Iran-Pakistan border, claimed responsibility for the attack. The organization, part of a regional Sunni insurgency in Shiite-dominated Iran, has for years killed and kidnapped Iranian soldiers and police officers.
The bomber struck what was to be a reconciliation meeting between Shiite and Sunni tribesmen to calm sectarian tensions in the southeast.
The region is a tangle of disenchanted clans and sects that claim they have been persecuted for generations. Jundallah and other groups pose no serious threat to the Iranian government, but they are capable of deadly ambushes against state and Shiite institutions, including a bombing at a mosque in May that killed more than 20 people.
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