The Habilian Association (Families of Iranian Victims of Terrorism), an Iran-based non-governmental organization and think tank, has released its 2025 annual terrorism report documenting terrorist acts against the country and its citizens.

The findings of the report were shared during the Day of Commemoration and Respect for Victims of Terrorism ceremony, co-organized by the Habilian Association and hosted by the Institute for Political and International Studies of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The ceremony was attended by Deputy Foreign Minister Dr Saeed Khatibzadeh, Deputy Head of the Judiciary Dr Seraj, and Habilian Secretary-General Seyed Mohammad Javad Hasheminejad, alongside the families of those who lost their lives in terrorist attacks.

First published in 2019 and now in its fifth edition, the report covers the year 2025 according to Iran’s official Solar Hijri calendar (spanning 21 March 2025 to 20 March 2026). Published in Persian and English, the document provides detailed data examining the activities of non-state terrorist organizations and state-sponsored actors.

“Attacks down by half, fatalities drop 43%”

The report highlighted a significant decline in nationwide terrorism indicators compared to the previous year. The number of recorded terrorist incidents fell by 50%, dropping from 52 in 2024 to 26 in 2025, while the death toll decreased by 43%, falling from 100 to 57.

Comparing three-year trends, the report noted that while terrorist incidents rose by 62.5% in 2024 compared to 2023, 2025 saw a decrease of 18.7% compared to 2023 and 50% compared to 2024. A steady decline in fatalities was also identified. Fatalities in 2025 fell by 64.6% compared to 2023, which included the victims of the Kerman Golzar attack. However, the average fatality rate per attack increased from 1.92 in 2024 to 2.20 in 2025.

The report stated that “Iran has been a victim of terrorist violence for nearly half a century, with 23,000 people killed by terrorism, while countries hostile to Tehran apply a clear double standard by providing terrorist organizations with offices, freedom of movement, and high-level contacts.”

“Terrorist threat almost entirely confined to southeast”

One of the most critical findings of the 2025 report was the narrowing geographic distribution of terrorist acts. While incidents in 2024 spanned six provinces and two countries, all 26 attacks in 2025 took place within Iranian borders and were concentrated in just four provinces.

Sistan and Baluchestan province remained the primary centre of terrorist incidents in the country. The report stated that 84.6% of terrorist attacks (22 operations) and 86% of casualties (49 victims) in 2025 were recorded in this province. Nevertheless, the number of attacks in Sistan and Baluchestan fell 39% year-on-year from 36 to 22, representing a 17% improvement in its share of total nationwide victims. Within the province, the highest number of attacks occurred in Iranshahr, followed by Zahedan.

Elsewhere in the country, three people were killed in two attacks in Kurdistan province, one person was killed in one attack in West Azerbaijan province, and four people died in one attack in Kerman province. Central and southern provinces targeted in previous years, including Tehran, Isfahan, Fars, and Hormozgan, recorded zero terrorist incidents in 2025.

“Security forces comprise over 75% of targets”

The report analyzed the occupational and demographic profile of the victims in detail. Of the 57 people killed, 56 were male and one was female; 49 were Iranian citizens and eight were Pakistani labourers.

Law enforcement personnel formed the largest group by occupation. In 2025, victims of terrorism included 19 police officers (33%), 11 Basij members, eight foreign Pakistani workers, six conscripted soldiers, six civilians, three border guards, three security personnel, and one member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The report stated: “Security and law enforcement forces accounted for 75.4% of total casualties, a figure that reaches 88% when Pakistani workers are excluded.”

The drop in IRGC fatalities from 27 in 2024 to one in 2025 was attributed to the withdrawal of Iranian military advisers from Syria and Lebanon. The report emphasized that civilians were not selected as direct primary targets, though civilian casualties did occur, including seven-month-old Navid Baluch Shir Mohammadi and a 60-year-old Baluch woman killed in the Zahedan courthouse attack, as well as 16-year-old Mansour Layegh-Jami killed at the Fahraj checkpoint in Kerman.

“Jaish al-Adl persists under a new name”

In its group-based assessment, the report determined that Jaish al-Adl remained the most active and deadliest group in Iran in 2025. Announcing its name as the “People’s Combatants Front” in late 2025, the group carried out 14 attacks resulting in 28 deaths, accounting for 53.8% of attacks and 49.1% of fatalities nationwide. While the group’s operations declined by 48% compared to 2024, its fatality rate per incident increased. The report evaluated the group’s rebranding as “a formal maneuver aimed at evading legal restrictions, escaping terrorist watchlists, and projecting an image of organizational vitality.”

After two years of inactivity, the Kurdish separatist group PJAK carried out three attacks in Kurdistan and West Azerbaijan provinces in July and August 2025, leaving four people dead. The report noted that the group had previously been unable to operate due to the Iran-Iraq security agreement, Iranian strikes against its positions in the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government area, and its expulsion from border regions. The attacks were described either as potential retaliation for an Iranian drone strike in Penjwin or as an effort by the group to assert operational independence amid the disarmament process undertaken by the PKK in Türkiye.

Ansar al-Furqan caused five deaths across two attacks, while the Baluch Nationalist Army (BNA) killed eight Pakistani workers in a single attack in Mehrestan. Arab separatist groups in Khuzestan, numbering up to 15, carried out no armed terrorist attacks in 2025 and engaged solely in media propaganda. Unclaimed attacks totaled six incidents resulting in 12 deaths, all of which occurred in Sistan and Baluchestan.

Regarding the removal of Israel and the US from the list of direct terrorist perpetrators compared to the 2024 report, the document cited the withdrawal of military advisers from Syria and Lebanon, two conventional conflicts (the “12-Day War” and the “Ramadan War”), and the classification of assassinations of political, scientific, and military figures during the January events within the framework of conventional warfare.

“Targeted assassinations and armed assaults dominate”

The report also examined tactical shifts among terrorist organizations. In 2025, over 69% of incidents (18 cases) were direct firearm assaults, accounting for 87.7% of fatalities. Unlike 2024, no suicide bombings or “inghimasi”-style raid attacks were recorded in 2025.

Conversely, targeted assassinations of local figures resurged. The targeting of Basij commander Javad Karimkoshteh in front of a mosque in Zahedan, local IRGC member Iraj Shams Eskani in a barbershop in Rask, Shehr-e Deraz police station chief Mahmoud Haghighat in Iranshahr, and tribal leader Mohammadreza Shahouzehi’s convoy in Eshkelabad were characterized as a strategy to weaken local security personnel and community leaders in border districts. The report noted that intelligence operations, including the “Martyrs of Security” drills and the seizure of 25 kilograms of explosives in Chabahar, foiled multiple planned attacks.

Chronology of 2025-2026 terrorist incidents

The monthly breakdown of incidents and details in the report were listed as follows:

• 27 March 2025: Master Sergeant Hossein Teymourpour was killed and two police officers were injured in an attack on a Police Station 12 patrol vehicle in Iranshahr. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 12 April 2025: Eight Pakistani workers had their hands and feet bound and were shot dead at close range during a raid on an auto repair shop in the village of Hizabad-e Pain, Mehrestan county, Sistan and Baluchestan province. Five victims were identified as Delshad, Naeem, Jafar, Danish, and Nasser. The Baluch Nationalist Army (BNA) claimed responsibility.
• 18 April 2025: Jaish al-Adl team leader Vali Mohammad Shahbakhsh was killed during the “Martyrs of Security” operation in the Qurin district of Zahedan; Quds Base Basij member Eshagh Mokhtari was killed during the operation.
• 4 May 2025: Gunfire targeted Police Station 11 patrol vehicles in Iranshahr, wounding four police officers; three attackers were captured. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 17 May 2025: An explosive device planted along a police patrol route in Saravan was defused. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 11 July 2025: Police officers Hossein Jafarniya and Hamidreza Mirshahi, along with conscript Abbas Beyraghifard, were killed in an attack on a police patrol in Chabahar; one attacker was killed. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 21 July 2025: Border Guard Senior Master Sergeant Sina Sattarvand was killed in a clash in the Baneh border area of Kurdistan province. PJAK operatives reportedly carried out the attack.
• 22 July 2025: Captain Mahmoud Motahhari died after gunfire was opened on a patrol vehicle from another car in Saravan. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 25 July 2025: Basij member Meysam Kabiri was killed and one person was injured when PJAK members opened fire on a military outpost in Aglan village, Sardasht county, West Azerbaijan province.
• 26 July 2025: Armed assailants attempting to storm the Zahedan Courthouse using grenades and firearms killed six people: seven-month-old infant Navid Baluch Shir Mohammadi, a 60-year-old Baluch woman, courthouse protection unit Lieutenants Hossein Rafienasab and Hosseinali Nouri, and conscripts Nima Karami and Ahmad Abdollahi; 22 people were injured. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 27 July 2025: Basij commander Javad Karimkoshteh was shot dead while on guard duty at the entrance of a mosque in the Shirabad district of Zahedan. Ansar al-Furqan claimed the assassination.
• 15 August 2025: Sergeant Ramin Sadeghi was killed and one security officer was wounded in an attack on a patrol vehicle in Iranshahr. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 22 August 2025: Five police officers were killed when gunfire targeted two Daman Police Station vehicles on the Iranshahr-Khash road: Master Sergeants Mohammadreza Rahimi and Mohammad Nowrouzi, Sergeant Hasan Tavakkoli, conscript Hadi Rouyaei, and Captain Gholamreza Vahdani. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 6 September 2025: Local IRGC member Iraj Shams Eskani was shot dead in a barbershop in Pishin, Rask county. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 16 September 2025: Younes Sayyad Arbabi and Ebrahim Piri were killed in an attack on a Sib and Suran county police vehicle on the Khash-Zahedan road; critically injured Sib and Suran Police Chief Colonel Ebrahim Fazilati died on 18 September. Jaish al-Adl claimed responsibility.
• 18 September 2025: Local Basij member and community figure Reza Azerkish (Shahlibor) was shot dead in Iranshahr. The attack was unclaimed.
• 2 October 2025: Gunfire targeting a motorcycle police patrol in Qasr-e Qand county wounded one officer and killed a passing civilian. The perpetrators were not identified.
• 1 November 2025: In an ambush on Shahouzehi tribal leader Mohammadreza Shahouzehi’s vehicle at the Eskelabad area along the Khash-Zahedan road, local Sunni Basij members Esmail Shaverzi and Mokhtar Shahouzehi died the same day, while Yaghoub Fard Salarzehi died on 12 November. The attack was unclaimed.
• 1 November 2025: Security officer Mohammad (Javad) Siahani was killed by gunfire from an unplated vehicle on the Iranshahr Bampur-Delgan road.
• 30 November 2025: An attack on an IRGC Quds Base patrol vehicle in the Lar border area of Zahedan killed IRGC serviceman Sajjad Marashi and Basij members Mohammad Bezzi, Alireza Nasirabadi, and Alireza Piri. The attack was claimed by Jaish al-Adl’s new structure, the “People’s Combatants Front.”
• 16 December 2025: A night attack on the Fahraj checkpoint in Kerman province killed police officer Saeed Pourhadi, security personnel Morad Salehi and Isa Barsam, and 16-year-old civilian Mansour Layegh-Jami. Ansar al-Furqan claimed responsibility.
• 16 December 2025: Gunfire was directed at police from two vehicles in Iranshahr; the attackers fled without causing security casualties.
• 7 January 2026: Shehr-e Deraz police station chief Mahmoud Haghighat was shot dead in Iranshahr. The assassination was claimed by the People’s Combatants Front (Jaish al-Adl).
• 9 February 2026: Twenty-year-old Basij member Iman Shahnavazi was wounded in a shooting targeting a vehicle in front of the special forces building on Imam Khomeini Street in Khash county and died several days later. The People’s Combatants Front claimed responsibility.
• 3 March 2026: Conscript Amir Mohammad Karimi was killed and three people were wounded when gunfire struck a patrol vehicle in Zahedan. The People’s Combatants Front claimed responsibility.
• 16 March 2026: Six people were killed when a police patrol vehicle was attacked in Taftan county: police officers Sajjad Batakva, Mohammad Javad Ensaf, Hamidreza Shahraki, and Alireza Pourbagher, conscript Alireza Sergezi, and an unidentified civilian. No group claimed responsibility.