At least two Iranian security officers have been killed in separate incidents along the eastern border with Pakistan, adding to a string of attacks near the strategically important port of Chabahar in recent weeks.
According to the Tasnim news agency, a female unit commander of the Basij paramilitary force, part of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), was shot dead outside her home in Mehrestan district of Sistan-Baluchestan province on Wednesday.
Another officer was also killed in a separate attack on a police vehicle, also in Mehrestan, near the Pakistani border.
On the same day, the Haalvash human rights group, which advocates for the province's Baluch minority community, said military helicopters were circling over the city of Iranshahr and that the security situation remained tense in several locations.
Iran's Sistan-Baluchestan province is home to the strategic port of Chabahar on its eastern flank, an area where US forces carried out airstrikes targeting infrastructure and naval control facilities in July.
In recent months the region has seen a number of attacks carried out by groups the Iranian government describes as "terrorist organizations" backed and supported from abroad.
Last week, according to the IRNA news agency, gunmen attacked a minibus carrying security personnel from a division stationed along the Makran coast, killing one person and wounding three others.
In a separate incident, IRNA reported that "a number of terrorists" killed a police officer after attacking a patrol in the area.
Earlier this month, the IRGC's Quds Force said it had killed at least two suspected attackers and destroyed a "terrorist group" in an operation near Chabahar port.
The IRGC statement said the operation was carried out after the group killed a member of Iran's security forces at a checkpoint near the city of Rasak.
The IRGC also said it seized a Starlink device and a range of weapons at the group's mountain hideout.
