Unidentified gunmen killed four police officers in south-eastern Iran on Sunday. Tasnim reported that a police patrol was ambushed in the provinces of Sistan and Balochistan. The news agency, which is considered the mouthpiece of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, spoke of a "terrorist attack".

According to the report, the police officers were on patrol on a connecting road between the cities of Khash and Taftan when they were ambushed. The provincial police have announced "revenge," Tasnim said. Further details about the incident were not initially known.

Two weeks ago, four people in the same province attacked a police station and killed two police officers. At the time, the state media blamed the Jihadist-Salafist terrorist group "Jaish ul-Adl". Zahedan, the capital of Sistan and Balochistan, is one of the few cities in Iran with a Sunni majority within the population. This faith is tolerated in Iran, where Shiite Islam is the state religion, but is systematically disadvantaged. In addition, Zahedan has developed into a hub for radical Sunni groups in recent years.

For months, demonstrations against the mullahs' regime have been taking place in Zahedan every week after Friday prayers. The protests began last September in the wake of the "Jin, Jiyan, Azadî revolution, which was sparked by the death of Kurdish woman Jina Mahsa Amini in the custody of Iran's so-called morality police, and are continuing despite brutal state terror.

For example, in the Zahedan massacre, also known as “Bloody Friday”, on 30 September 2022, police forces, Basij militias and Revolutionary Guards killed at least 120 people. The mass killing with firearms was partly targeted, partly indiscriminate. The victims were unarmed people, including participants in the weekly Friday prayers, demonstrators and bystanders.