Iran President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister confirmed dead in helicopter crash
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Tehran, May 20: Amid the escalating tensions in West Asia, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, and other officials are presumed dead after the helicopter that was carrying them was found completely burned in a forest on Monday.
Rescue teams fought blizzards and difficult terrain through the night to reach the wreckage in East Azerbaijan province in the early hours of Monday.
Iran Media now announcing death of Iranian President and the Foreign Minister. pic.twitter.com/o9kCFjpT3k
— Aditya Raj Kaul (@AdityaRajKaul) May 20, 2024
Iranian state television reported there was "no sign of life" at the crash site of the helicopter that carried Raisi, Amirabdollahian, and others. "No sign of surviving passengers" were found at the crash site, semi-official news agency Mehr News reported, citing the head of the Iranian Red Crescent Society. There has not been any official confirmation about the president’s death.
Drone footage published on state media FARS News Agency showed the chopper’s wreckage on a steep hillside. Notably, Raisi was returning after inaugurating a dam on Iran’s common border with the Azerbaijan Republic, when his helicopter crashed upon landing in northern Iran’s Varzaqan region on Sunday evening local time, according to state news agency IRNA.
East Azerbaijan’s governor, Malik Rahmati, and Raisi’s security detail were also in the helicopter. The president’s convoy included three helicopters, two of which landed safely, according to Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency.
Communication with Raisi’s chopper was cut off about half an hour into the flight, Iran’s Vice President for Executive Affairs Mohsen Mansouri said. Raisi was travelling to Tabriz city to launch an oil project.
Inclement weather conditions and impassibility of the area had hampered search and rescue operations, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps’ chief Pirhossein Koulivand, reportedly said. Turkey and Russia had sent aircraft to help with the search operations.
Ebrahim Raisi
President Ebrahim Raisi, 63, a hard-liner who formerly led the country’s judiciary, is viewed as a protégé of Khamenei and some analysts have suggested he could replace the 85-year-old leader after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s death or resignation.
Raisi won Iran’s 2021 presidential election, a vote that saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic Republic’s history. Raisi is sanctioned by the US in part over his involvement in the mass execution of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 at the end of the bloody Iran-Iraq war.