Gunmen opened fire on a military parade held in the southwestern Iranian city of Ahvaz on Saturday, killing 25 people and injuring 60 others, state media reported.

The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency said that civilians including women and children were among the dead. The semi-official Tasnim News Agency reported that eight members of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, a branch of Iran's armed forces, were killed in the morning attack.

(People run from the scene of shooting) 
[Getty/Kyodo]

One man who was marching in the parade told IRNA that his 4-year-old son who came to watch him was killed and that his wife was wounded in the attack.

"The terrorists disguised as Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and Basiji (volunteer) forces opened fire at government officials and people from behind the stand during the parade," Gholam-Reza Shariati, the governor of Khuzestan Province, of which Ahvaz is the capital, was quoted by IRNA as saying.

Brig. Gen. Abolfazl Shekarchi, senior spokesman of Iran's armed forces, told IRNA that all four gunmen were killed.

He also alleged that the attackers received financial and weapons support from two countries around Persian Gulf, without naming the countries.

IRNA said that the situation has been brought under control.

The Al-Ahwaz group, a Saudi-affiliated terrorist group, claimed responsibility for the attack on the parade, according to IRNA.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif posted on Twitter that the gunmen were armed and recruited by "a foreign regime," blaming regional countries and their "U.S. masters."

"Terrorists recruited, trained, armed & paid by a foreign regime have attacked Ahvaz. Children and journos among casualties. Iran holds regional terror sponsors and their U.S. masters accountable for such attacks," he wrote.

"Iran will respond swiftly and decisively in defense of Iranian lives," he added.

Military parades were being held around the country Saturday to mark the anniversary of Iran's eight-year war with Iraq in the 1980s.