A commander and pilot of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards die in a gyroplane crash in Sistan and Baluchistan

A gyroplane crash near Sirkan in southeastern Iran killed two Iranian Revolutionary Guards, one of whom was the head of a brigade.

According to the Fars news agency, two members of Iran’s special Revolutionary Guards were killed in a gyroplane crash on Monday in the southeast province of Sistan-Baluchistan, close to the city of Sirkan. One of them was Second Brigadier General Hamid Mazandarani.

General Mazandarani was in charge of the Nineva Brigade in Golestan province, which is in the north of Iran. It is still not clear why he was in the unstable southeast.

There are often violent fights in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan, which borders Afghanistan and Pakistan. These fights involve Iranian security forces, Sunni militant groups, and drug smugglers. Ten Iranian border guards were killed last month in fights with people thought to be Sunni terrorists in the area.

The Revolutionary Guards called General Mazandarani and his pilot “martyrs,” but they didn’t say anything else about the crash. The news agency said, “Second Brigadier General Hamid Mazandarani, who was in charge of the Nineva Brigade in Golestan province, and his pilot were killed in this accident.”

This event shows that Sistan-Baluchistan still has a lot of security problems. In the past few years, both militant action and cross-border smuggling have made things worse.