15 dead in Iran shrine attack

TEHRAN: At least 15 people were killed Wednesday by armed terrorists who attacked a Muslim shrine in the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, state television said. The Islamic State terrorist group claimed responsibility for the attack, saying the firing attack left 20 dead.

Forty others were wounded when “terrorists attacked the Shah Cheragh mausoleum in Shiraz”, the state broadcaster said, updating an earlier toll from the judiciary’s news website of nine dead.

At least one woman and two children were among those killed, Fars news agency said. Local media reported three assailants carried out the attack and that two had been detained, with Fars news agency saying “the terrorists are not Iranian”. But a local official said there was only one attacker. “Only one terrorist was involved in this attack,” judiciary chief Kazem Mousavi told state television. The state broadcaster also reported one arrest and said that the assailant was a terrorist affiliated with takfiri groups. The term takfiri in Iran and in several other countries refers to radical Sunni Islamist groups. Meanwhile, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for an attack on the shrine in southern Iran that state media said killed more than a dozen people. An IS fighter opened fire on worshippers at the Shah Cheragh shrine in the city of Shiraz, “killing at least 20 Shiites and wounded dozens of others”, the radical Sunni Muslim jihadist group said in a statement via Telegram channels.