'At least 70 killed' in explosions near tomb of Iranian Guards commander Qassem Soleimani during ceremony
An explosion at a cemetery in Iran where a ceremony was being held to
mark the 2020 assassination of Iran's top commander has killed more
than 70 people, it has been reported.
There were two explosions at
the site in the city of Kerman where the former Islamic Revolutionary
Guard Corps commander Qasem Soleimani is buried, state media reports
added.
Babak Yektaparast, a spokesperson for Iran's emergency services, told
state media that 73 people had been killed and 170 injured.
Hundreds of people had reportedly gathered at the site ahead of the event.
An Iranian official described the explosions as "terroristic
attacks", state media reported, without elaborating on who could be
behind them.
Soleimani, once Iran's top military general, was assassinated in a US
drone strike during a visit to Iraq in 2020 to meet then-prime minister
Adil Abdul-Mahdi.
The drone strike caused a major diplomatic
crisis between the US and Iran, leading to retaliatory rocket strikes
against US military sites in Iraq and pushing the two countries to the
brink of war.
More than a million people took to the streets for the funeral - leading to a stampede in which 56 mourners were killed.
