10 Iranian border guards killed by unknown attackers

Oct. 26 (UPI) -- Ten Iranian border guards were killed Saturday in the southeast part of the country by unknown attackers, state media reported.

Armed attackers descended on two patrol groups of soldiers and police officers in the border province of Sistan-Baluchestan, around 745 miles southeast of the capital city of Tehran, according to the Tehran Times.

No group had yet to claim responsibility for the attack as of 11:30 a.m. EDT Saturday.

The province is the country's second largest and borders Pakistan and Afghanistan. and armed clashes with drug traffickers or groups from the country's Sunni Islam minority population are common.

Iranian border officers also routinely encounter confrontations with the country's minority Baluch population. There are close to 6.9 million of the nomadic ethnic group in neighboring Pakistan and 2 million in Iran.

Iranian officials have called for a full investigation into the deadly attack, which the country is referring to as an ambush.

The incident comes as Iran weathered overnight missile strikes launched by Israel. The strikes were in retaliation to Iranian ballistic missile barrages on Israel earlier in the month.

In April, 11 people were killed in two separate incidents in Pakistan's Balochistan region near the Iranian border.