TEHRAN -- Sunni cleric Molavi Abdulvahed Rigi has been kidnapped and murdered by unknown individuals, officials in Sistan and Baluchestan province say.
Molavi Rigi was the Friday prayers leader of Imam Hussein Mosque in Khash, in the southeastern province. He was also a seminary teacher.
Mehdi Shamsabadi, the province’s prosecutor, said the cleric was the mosque on Thursday, but unknown individuals called him from the rear door, making him sit in a car that had no license plate.
Shamsabadi said local forces had been mobilized to find the whereabouts of the cleric since Thursday, but his dead body was found on the roadside in Khash county. The cleric was hit by three bullets, said the prosecutor, adding the bullets came out of his head.
The official also said the police are investigating the case to detect and arrest the perpetrators.
The Sunni scholar had earlier cited threats that some groups made against him.
“Even opposition groups have threatened me but these threats won’t work,” Rigi had told a delegation dispatched by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei to the province.
Footage of a short dialogue between him and the delegation shows his emphasis on the importance of the Islamic establishment in Iran and unity among Shia and Sunni Muslims.
He said not even one individual from the mosque that he led had taken to the streets to participate in the riots in Khash.
“I told them no one is entitled to go out of the mosque because we knew hypocrites were out there and we knew what they were doing… we are aware of the plots of enemies and hypocrites.”
“We love this country; the Leader is our friend,” he said. “This country will be no good to us, to Islam, and even to the families of Muslims after the Islamic establishment.”

Assassination Attempt Thwarted

Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) says its forces thwarted an assassination attempt against Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda.
The IRGC said in a statement that its

forces identified and arrested members of a terror outfit affiliated with the Jaish al-Adl terrorist group in the eastern province of Khorasan Razavi.
It said the terrorist team planned to carry out destabilizing acts and terrorist operations in the holy city of Mashhad.
The terrorists also intended to attack the office of the governor general of Khorasan Razavi, it added.
According to the statement, huge amounts of weapons, ammunition and explosives have been discovered from the hideout of the terrorists.
All the terrorists’ agents in other provinces have also been identified and are under investigation, it said.