TEHRAN -- The largest arms smuggling operation has been thwarted amid a surge in the illegal influx of weapons into Iran during the past few months, according to local Iranian media on Friday.
A report on the Tabnak website carried a few photos of the cache of arms confiscated by security agencies in Suleimaniyah, a city in the east of the Kurdistan region of Iraq. No further details were provided.
Last Saturday, Iran’s intelligence forces said that in a security operation, it managed to dismantle an international arms and ammunition smuggling band in southeastern Sistan and Baluchestan province.
The weapons confiscated from the smuggling gang were transferred to the country to be used in the recent foreign-backed unrest in Iran.
IRGC forces also, in another operation, detained an agent of the intelligence service of one of the Persian Gulf states who was planning to carry out anti-security measures in the west of Hormozgan province.
In Shiraz, security forces arrested those who sought to carry out a bombing the night of the terrorist attack on the Shah Cheragh shrine.
It came after public reports about a “suspicious package” that was sighted in one of the main roads of Shiraz on the night of the terrorist attack on October 26, shortly after which a disposal team arrived at the scene and neutralized it.
The perpetrators of the bombing were identified and arrested during a hunt in the provinces of Esfahan and Fars, Iran’s intelligence forces were quoted as saying by Iran’s Fars news agency.
In October, IRGC’s Hamzeh Seyyed al-Shohada base said a gang was intercepted by the IRGC forces as it was looking to smuggle arms into the country from the northwestern border.
Nine Heckler & Koch G3 rifles and a large cache of ammunition were seized from their possession, according to the statement.
The statement noted that by providing arms to terrorists and separatist agents inside Iran, the enemy aimed to “disrupt public security,” disseminate fake news about riots and death toll and use the issue for political gains.
The raid on the arms smuggling group comes as terrorist groups have in recent weeks ramped up their activities to undermine the security of the country by supporting deadly riots that sparked in the wake of the death of Mahsa Amini.
The foreign-backed violent riots have in the past two months claimed hundreds of lives belonging to both security forces and ordinary people.