Clashes between the security forces and Iran's armed opposition group, the People's Mujahedeen, near the southern Iranian city of Shiraz, left an unspecified number of the group's members dead, local radio reported.
Quoting the security forces in Fars province, it said "a group of Mujahedeen terrorists crossed into the country with the aim of planting bombs" in the country.
The clash happened in the village of Abadeh, the radio said, but it gave no details on the number of those killed, nor where the Mujahedeen were going to place the bombs.
"During the clashes, numerous weapons and ammunition were captured, the terrorist attempt was blocked and the terrorists were killed," the radio added.
(In a statement faxed to AFP in Nicosia the Mujahedeen confirmed there had been fighting in the Shiraz area, saying that two of its members were killed in three separate rounds of clashes between the villages of Abadeh and Safa-Shahr to the north of Shiraz, the provincial capital of Fars.)
(But the statesman said 35 members of the state security forces and agents of the intelligence ministry were killed or wounded in the clashes, including the commander of the local barracks.)
(He named the two Mujahedeen killed as Bahram Baradaran, 31, and Ali Malek-Mohammedi, 45, saying they were shot in clashes after throwing grenades at the security forces, causing casualties) -- TEHRAN (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
