DUBAI, Sept 9 (Reuters) – Sunni Kurdish cleric Mamosta Mohammad Nezhati was killed in northwestern Iran, the Revolutionary Guards said in a statement reported on Wednesday by the semi-official Mehr news agency.
The statement accused what it called “Zionist-American Kurdish separatist groups” of carrying out the attack.
The Guards’ West Azerbaijan provincial command said the killing of the local cleric was an attempt to create divisions between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims and undermine security in the province.
In a Telegram post, the semi-official Fars news agency described Nezhati as a member of Basij, a paramilitary force linked to the Guards.
It quoted the Guards’ statement as saying he had a long history of cooperation with Basij organisations for professors, seminarians and clerics.
His killing follows that of Molavi Mohammad Anvar Rigi, a Sunni Baluch Friday prayer leader in the southeastern border town of Mirjaveh, who was killed by unidentified gunmen in July.
In border provinces with large ethnic minority populations, such as Sistan-Baluchistan and the Kurdish-populated western provinces, Iran has long faced militancy targeting security forces and figures associated with the state.
(Reporting by Dubai Newsroom; Editing by Sharon Singleton)
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