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Assailants on motorbikes shot dead nine people, including a woman and two children, during protests in two separate attacks in southern Iran, AFP reported on Thursday, citing state media.

Three suspects were arrested and the hunt was on for others after Wednesday’s first attack on protesters and security forces in Izeh, said a senior judicial official in Khuzestan province.

In a separate attack four hours later in Iran’s third largest city Isfahan, two assailants on a motorcycle fired automatic weapons at Basij paramilitary force members, killing two and wounding two others, Fars news agency reported.

The attacks occurred as protests over the September 16 death in custody of Mahsa Amini intensified on the third anniversary of bloody unrest over fuel price hikes.

The dead included a 45-year-old woman and two children aged nine and 13, said an official at the Jondishapour hospital in Ahvaz, the provincial capital.

Among the eight wounded were two Basij and three police officers, according to a security official interviewed by state television.