A car bomb attack killed at least 11 members of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard in southeastern Iran this morning, according to state media. The Fars news agency said a dissident Sunni group had claimed responsibility for the blast.

The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported that the bomb was concealed in a parked car in Zahedan, capital of Sistan-Baluchestan Province. According to IRNA, two motorcyclists opened fire on the Guards' bus as it approached the car at around 6.30am. When the bus stopped, they detonated the bomb by remote control and fled the scene.

Guards commander Qasem Rezaei told IRNA: “This blind terrorist operation led to the martyrdom of 18 citizens of Zahedan.”

Fars, however, reported a death toll of 11, with 31 injured. The agency added: “A few moments ago, a group known as the Jundallah, led by Abdolmalek Rigi, one of the bandits in the east of the country, issued a statement claiming responsibility for this terrorist operation.”

In September last year, Iran’s Shia regime said it had crushed the hardline Jundallah – “Soldiers of Allah” – which claims to represent the interests of Iran’s 1.4m ethnic Baluchis – Sunni Muslims with tribal ties to Pakistan. In mid-March, the group claimed responsibility for an attack on a government motorcade which left 20 dead. In other attacks, the group has kidnapped and murdered members of the state security forces.

Pakistani officials have said that Jundallah is linked to al-Qaeda. Meanwhile, Tehran has blamed terrorism in the country’s south-east on foreign agitators – naming America and Israel – which it accuses of trying to stoke sectarian tension among the country’s minorities to undermine the regime. Ethnic Persians make up just over half of the country’s population of close to 70 million. Other groups include Azeris, Kurds, Arabs and Armenian Christians.

Illegal drug trafficking has also brought sustained violence to the border region, where security forces battle gangs smuggling heroin and hashish cultivated and processed in Afghanistan and Pakistan for sale in the Middle East and the West. According to the United Nations, between 40 and 65 per cent of residents of Shirabad, a small town near Zahedan, “earn their living either by smuggling goods between Iran and Pakistan or by providing logistical support to local drug trafficking criminal organisations”.

The Revolutionary Guard targeted in today's attack is an elite force seen to embody Iran's Shia regime. Making up around a third of the nation's military, the corps was founded in 1979 as a praetorian guard loyal to Ayatollah Khomeini.

Majid Razavi, an Interior Ministry official, said one of those behind today’s explosion was arrested less than one hour after the attack. Fars reported the arrest of “several bandits and perpetrators of the incident”. The report now published on the IRNA website states: “Police are now after the motorcyclists, who successfully escaped the scene of the crime.”

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