TEHRAN, July 8 (Xinhua) -- Iranian police forces have seized large number of weapons, including an anti-aircraft gun, from a militant group in the southeastern province of Sistan and Balouchestan, Tasnim news agency reported on Saturday.
The Police raided an arms depot of the so-called Jaish al-Adl "terrorist" group in in Koohsefid region, near the city of Saravan, and confiscated assault rifles and ammunition, the provincial police commander Hossein Rahimi told Tasnim.
The 35 AK-47 machine guns, two SPG-9 guns, an anti-aircraft 14.5 mm gun with a range of seven kilometers and tens of cartridges, as well as a huge amount of ammunition were among the arms seized in the police operation, Rahimi was quoted as saying.
"Members of Jaish al-Adl terrorist group had plans to use the weapons against civilians in Sistan and Balouchestan Province," the commander said but he did not specify the time of operation.
In April, 10 Iranian border guards were killed by the Sunni militants of Jaish al-Adl, or the Army of Justice, in a cross-border attack on the frontier with Pakistan.
The Sistan-Baluchestan province in southeast Iran has long been plagued by drug smuggling gangs and separatist militants. The population of the province is predominantly Sunni Muslim, while the majority of Iranians are Shias.
Jaish al-Adl has carried out several attacks on Iranian security forces with the aim of highlighting what they claim is "discrimination" against Sunni Muslims and the Baluch ethnic group in the province.
The militants has claimed responsibility for a number of other bloody attacks since 2013.
