Gunmen Kill 6 People, including Local IRGC Chief, in Iran Towns

A billboard bearing a picture of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli air strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on September 27, is displayed in Tehran on September 30, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
A billboard bearing a picture of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli air strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on September 27, is displayed in Tehran on September 30, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
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Gunmen Kill 6 People, including Local IRGC Chief, in Iran Towns

A billboard bearing a picture of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli air strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on September 27, is displayed in Tehran on September 30, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
A billboard bearing a picture of Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli air strike on Beirut's southern suburbs on September 27, is displayed in Tehran on September 30, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)

Unidentified gunmen killed six people in two separate attacks Tuesday in the same province in southern Iran, including a local chief of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), state TV reported.

The head of a town council and two volunteer members of the Guard were also among the dead in the first attack, it said. It occurred after the victims participated in a school ceremony in Nikshahar town, about 1,350 kilometers southeast of the capital, Tehran, the report said.

It identified the town council chief as Parviz Kadkhodaei but provided no other details of the attack in the southeastern province of Sistan and Baluchistan, The Associated Press reported.

Two police officers were killed in the second attack, which took place in Khash town in the same province, it said.

No one immediately took responsibility for the attacks.
In September, gunmen killed four border guards in the province in two separate attacks. The militant group Jaish al-Adl, which seeks greater rights for the ethnic Baluch minority, claimed responsibility for one of the attacks, in which one officer and two soldiers in the border guard were killed.



France Add First Nuclear Reactor in 25 Years to Grid

A general view of the three reactors making up the Flamanville nuclear power plant with the third-generation European Pressurised Water nuclear reactor (EPR) in the background in Flamanville, France, April 25, 2024. REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/File Photo
A general view of the three reactors making up the Flamanville nuclear power plant with the third-generation European Pressurised Water nuclear reactor (EPR) in the background in Flamanville, France, April 25, 2024. REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/File Photo
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France Add First Nuclear Reactor in 25 Years to Grid

A general view of the three reactors making up the Flamanville nuclear power plant with the third-generation European Pressurised Water nuclear reactor (EPR) in the background in Flamanville, France, April 25, 2024. REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/File Photo
A general view of the three reactors making up the Flamanville nuclear power plant with the third-generation European Pressurised Water nuclear reactor (EPR) in the background in Flamanville, France, April 25, 2024. REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/File Photo

France connected the Flamanville 3 nuclear reactor to its grid on Saturday morning, state-run operator EDF said, in the first addition to the country's nuclear power network in 25 years.

The reactor, which began operating in September ahead of the grid connection, is going online 12 years later than originally planned and at a cost of around 13 billion euros - four times the original budget.

"EDF teams have achieved the first connection of the Flamanville EPR to the national grid at 11:48am (1048 GMT). The reactor is now generating electricity," EDF said in a statement, Reuters reported.

The Flamanville 3 European Pressurised Reactor is France's largest at 1.6 gigawatts (GW) and one of the world's biggest, along with China's 1.75 GW Taishan reactor, which is based on a similar design, and Finland's Olkiluoto.

It is the first to be connected to the grid since Civaux 2 in 1999 but is being brought into service at a time of sluggish consumption, with France exporting a record amount of electricity this year.

EDF is planning to build another six new reactors to fulfil a 2022 pledge made by President Emmanuel Macron as part of the country's energy transition plans, although questions remain around the funding and timeline of the new projects.