A provincial official said today those behind a mosque bombing that killed around 20 people in Iran had been hired by the United States, Tehran's arch-foe, a semi-official news agency reported.
The US State Department this evening strongly denied the claims.
Jalal Sayyah, at the governor's office in Sistan-Baluchestan province, said three people had been arrested in connection with yesterday evening's blast in a crowded mosque in the southeastern city of Zahedan, near Pakistan.
The explosion, which some Iranian news agencies say may have been a suicide bombing, took place on a religious holiday two weeks before the June 12th presidential election in the mainly Shia Muslim country. More than 80 people were wounded.
It was the deadliest such bombing incident in the Islamic Republic in more than a decade. In April 2008, a blast in a mosque in the southern city of Shiraz killed 14 people.
"It has been confirmed that those behind the terrorist act in Zahedan were hired by America and the arrogance's other hands," Sayyah told Fars News Agency.
Iranian leaders, who often accuse the United States and its allies of seeking to destabilise it, refer to Washington as the "Great Satan" guilty of "global arrogance".
Iran says a Sunni rebel group, Jundollah (God's Soldiers), which has been operating in the border region is part of the Sunni Islamist al-Qaeda network and has accused the United States and Britain of backing it.
Washington denied any involvement in the attack.
"We condemn this terrorist attack in the strongest possible terms," said State Department spokesman Ian Kelly. "We do not sponsor any form of terrorism in Iran."
The province is home to Iran's mostly Sunni ethnic Baluchis and it is scene of frequent clashes between security forces and heavily armed drugs smugglers and bandits.
Reuters