Kamal Ghorui
At least five people were killed and 14 others injured in two separate explosions in Iran on Saturday, according to state and local media reports.Four people died after a gas explosion ripped through a residential building in the southwestern city of Ahvaz, the state-run Tehran Times reported, citing the head of the city’s fire department. In a separate incident, one person was killed , and 14 others were injured in an explosion at the southern port city of Bandar Abbas, a local official told news agencies.
The blast at Bandar Abbas destroyed “two floors, several vehicles, and shops”, though the cause remains unclear.Israel has denied any involvement in the explosions, as per two Israeli officials. The semi-official Tasnim news agency dismissed social media claims that a Revolutionary Guard navy commander was targeted, calling them “completely false.”The official IRNA news agency quoted Hormozgan province’s director general of crisis management, Mehrdad Hassanzadeh, as saying the cause of the explosion was under investigation. He added that “those injured in the incident are being transferred to the hospital by emergency responders,” without reporting any fatalities.Images broadcast by state television showed the building’s facade blown out, exposing parts of the interior, with debris scattered across the area. Other Iranian media outlets carried similar reports, also without giving details on the cause of the blast, as cited by AFP. The incident comes against the backdrop of heightened tensions between Tehran and Washington, following a crackdown on the largest protests to hit Iran in three years and ongoing Western concerns over the country’s nuclear programme.The protests, which began in December over economic hardship, marked a major challenge to Iran’s clerical leadership. An Iranian official told Reuters that at least 5,000 people were killed, including 500 members of the security forces.U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that an “armada” was heading towards Iran, while sources said on Friday that he was considering options that include targeted strikes on Iranian security forces.Meanwhile, Iran’s army chief Amir Hatami on Saturday warned the United States and Israel, saying the country’s armed forces were on high alert in response to Washington’s significant military deployments in the Gulf.
