TEHRAN, Oct 26: Iran said it executed 16 “rebels” on Saturday in reprisal after gunmen killed 14 guards near the border with Pakistan, in a rugged area often rocked by violence.

The ambush took place late on Friday night in the mountains of Sistan-Baluchestan, which neighbours Pakistan.

Iran’s deputy interior minister called on the Pakistan government to “take measures to control the border more seriously”.

“Fourteen border guards were killed during armed clashes in the region of Saravan, and five others were wounded,” the official Irna news agency said, citing what it called an informed source.

The unnamed source identified the gunmen as “bandits or rebels opposed to the Islamic republic”.

But Deputy Interior Minister Ali Abdollahi said the guards were killed in an ambush set by Iranians who were “members of hostile groups”.

“Three soldiers have been taken hostage and taken to the other side of the border in Pakistan,” he said, adding Iran would “take measures to secure their release”.

In retaliation for the attack, the Iranian authorities said they hanged 16 “rebels” held at a prison in the region.

“Sixteen rebels linked to groups hostile to the (Iranian) government were hanged this morning in the prison of Zahedan in response to the death of border guards in Saravan,” Mohammad Marzieh, attorney general of Sistan-Baluchestan, was quoted as saying by Fars news agency.

Abdollahi, the minister, said “we warned the rebel groups that any attack targeting civilians or members of the security forces would not go unanswered”.

The region has seen bloody clashes during the past few years.

Officials say more than 4,000 police officers and soldiers have been killed there in three decades of fighting with drug traffickers.

Western governments allege that Iran is a major transit route for drugs that originate in Afghanistan and are trafficked across its territory.

People smugglers also use the route to traffic illegal immigrants to Europe, via Iran and Turkey. Iranian officials say Tehran has spent millions of dollars to build a “wall” along lengthy stretches of its 1,700-kilometre border with Pakistan and Afghanistan in a bid to stop the trafficking.

Work on the barrier began in the 1990s and is expected to be completed before the end of next year.

Tehran says it is fighting a deadly war against drug traffickers who make up half of its prison population.

But Jundallah, a militant group, has also carried out attacks on civilians and officials in Sistan-Baluchestan, including a December 2010 suicide bombing in the city of Shabahar that killed 39 people.

The Iranian authorities hanged 11 suspected members of Jundallah at Zahedan prison in response to the deadly bombing.

Jundallah, whose leader Abdolmalek Rigi was hanged in June 2010, has been waging a deadly insurgency in south-eastern Iran for almost a decade.

The group says it is “fighting for the rights of the ethnic Sunni Baluchis”, who make up a significant part of the province’s population.—Agencies