Iran blames Saudi Arabia for deadly attacks in Tehran

The powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps accused Saudi Arabia of being behind the action, a rare such incident in Iran. Suicide bombers and gunmen attacked the Iranian parliament and the Mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini in Tehran on Wednesday, killing at least 12 people in a twin assault which Iran's Revolutionary Guards blamed on regional rival Saudi Arabia.

"This terrorist attack happened only a week after the meeting between the US president (Donald Trump) and the (Saudi) backward leaders who support terrorists. The fact that Islamic State has claimed responsibility proves that they were involved in the brutal attack," a Guards statement said.

Saudi Foreign Minister del Al-Jubeir, speaking in Berlin, said he did not know was responsible and there was no evidence Saudi extremists were involved.

The attacks could also exacerbate tensions in Iran between newly re-elected President Hassan Rouhani, a pragmatist, and his rivals among hardline clerics and the Revolutionary Guards. Attackers dressed as women burst through parliament's main entrance in central Tehran, deputy interior minister Mohammad Hossein Zolfaghari said, according to the Tasnim news agency. One of them detonated a suicide vest in the parliament, he said. About five hours after the first reports, Iranian media said four people who had attacked parliament were dead and the incident was over. At least 12 people were killed by the attackers, the head of Iran's emergency department, Pir-Hossein Kolivand said. "I was inside the parliament when shooting happened.

Everyone was shocked and scared. I saw two men shooting randomly," said one journalist at the scene. Soon after the assault on parliament, another bomber detonated a suicide vest near the shrine of the Islamic Republic's revered founder, Ayatollah Khomeini, a few kilometers south of the city, Zolfaghari said.

A second attacker was shot dead, he said. The shrine is a main destination for tourists and religious pilgrims. "The terrorists had explosives strapped to them and suddenly entered the shrine and started to shoot around," said the shrine's overseeer, Mohammadali Ansari. The Intelligence Ministry said security forces had arrested another "terrorist team" planning a third attack.

"I was shopping and suddenly heard shooting," said housewife Maryam Saghari, 36, who lives near parliament. "People started to run away from the area. I was very scared. I don't want to live in fear," she told Reuters.

The raids on two of Iran's most highly-protected sites will jolt Rouhani, who positions himself as a reformer, and his political rivals among the hardline clerics and the Revolutionary Guards, who are responsible for national security. In an appeal for unity, Rouhani's chief of staff, Hamid Aboutalebi, took to Twitter to praise the security services."If this attacks had happened in any other city in Europe or in the world, it would have left many casualties. Applause to the power and firmness of our revolutionary guards, Basij, police and security forces," he wrote.

Two senior government officials, who asked not to be named, said the blasts might prompt a blame game and exacerbate political in-fighting. "They (hardliners) are very angry and will use every opportunity to grow in strength to isolate Rouhani," said one of the officials. The other said the attacks, and speculation over who backed them, would push Iran toward "a harsher regional policy". Iran's tussle with Saudi Arabia for regional influence is being played out in the Yemen war as well as in

Syria and Iraq.