The Popular Fighters Front announced that, after breaking a siege, some of its forces had withdrawn from the clash site in the Bakhshan district of Saravan; simultaneously, the IRGC reported the deaths of four gunmen and three of its own personnel, as well as the discovery of explosive devices.
A major clash between security forces and members of the Popular Fighters Front erupted early Saturday morning, September 12, 2026, in the Bakhshan district of Saravan in Baluchistan—a confrontation that reportedly lasted about nine hours and affected various parts of the city.
In a statement, the Popular Fighters Front announced that security forces had attacked one of the group’s units and that support teams had intervened to break the siege. The group claimed that by expanding the conflict to scattered locations across the city, they managed to breach the initial siege line and extract some of the encircled fighters. The Front also promised to release further details regarding the operation.
Meanwhile, the Quds Headquarters of the IRGC Ground Force described the event as an “operation against a professional terrorist team,” stating that the individuals at the scene had intended to carry out an assassination plot in Saravan. The IRGC announced that four gunmen were killed in the operation and that significant quantities of weapons, ammunition, and explosives were recovered from the site. The force also reported the deaths of three of its own personnel and raised the possibility that the number of slain gunmen could rise.
According to subsequent reports, Iranian state media identified two of the killed military personnel as Misagh Sani and Mehdi Sarhadi. However, local sources associated with the Balochistan Human Rights Documentation Network cited the number of military casualties—killed and wounded—as “dozens,” a figure that contradicts the official account. Videos released from the scene of the clash show ambulances being dispatched to the area, and military forces using heavy and semi-heavy weapons, as well as quadcopters, to locate the positions of the armed individuals.
