ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi was confirmed dead in a Sunday helicopter crash in a mountainous region of northwestern Iran, state media said.
“Ebrahim Raisi, the eighth president of Iran, has been martyred after a helicopter carrying him and his entourage crashed in Varzaqan region in East Azerbaijan Province, northwest of the country,” the state IRNA news agency confirmed.
Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, East Azerbaijan governor Malik Rahmati, and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s representative to East Azerbaijan Mohammad Ali Ale-Hashem were also on board the helicopter and confirmed dead.
In a statement, the Iranian government said it will continue operation as normal following the death of the president.
‘”We assure our loyal nation that the path of service will continue with the timeless spirit of Ayatolllah Raisi,” the Iranian government said, stressing that it will continue to operate “without the slightest disruption.”
The crash in East Azerbaijan province occurred in a mountainous area with dense fog and bad weather conditions, where the helicopter made a “hard landing.” Efforts of rescue teams to reach the site were complicated.
Raisi and his delegation were returning from Iran’s border with Azerbaijan, where they inaugurated a joint dam project.
A massive search and rescue mission was launched around the crash site and efforts continued overnight until the wreckage of the helicopter was found on early Monday.
Under Iranian law, Vice President Mohammad Mokhber will become the interim president of the country and schedule a date to hold a presidential election within 50 days.
Widely seen as the successor to Khamenei, Raisi, 63, was an ultraconservative chief justice whose tenure was signified by the acceleration of Iran’s nuclear program and the government’s brutal crackdown on countrywide protests sparked by the death of Kurdish woman Zhina (Mahsa) Amini in September 2022.
Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani has been appointed as acting foreign minister following Amir-Abdollahian's death.
He also played a big role in the execution of thousands of political prisoners in Iran in 1988, in charge of what later became known as a “death committee” under the order of then-supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani on Monday morning extended his “deepest condolences” to the Iranian government and people over the death of Raisi and his delegation in the helicopter crash, saying it “made us sad inside.”
“The death of the late president Raisi is a great loss for the Islamic republic, the Muslim people of Iran, and its friends, but we are sure that the brave people of Iran and the Islamic republic will overcome this loss,” President Barzani said in a statement.
Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani also showed solidarity with the Iranian people over Raisi’s death.
“We ask God to have mercy on the souls of the deceased and to grant patience and comfort to their families and the Iranian people in general,” Prime Minister Barzani said.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani also sent his condolences to the Iranian government and people over the death of Raisi.
“It is with great sadness and great sorrow that we receive the news of the death of President of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, and their companions,” Sudani said in a statement.
Later on Monday, the Iraqi government declared one day of national mourning over the death of Raisi and his companions.
Khamenei also announced five days of national mourning in Iran.
Raisi was born in 1960 in a village near Mashhad, the hometown of Supreme Leader Khamenei, with whom he was close. He made his way up the ranks of the justice system, from a Tehran court clerk to chief justice.
In 2021, he was elected president of Iran in a vote that saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic republic’s history.
During Raisi’s time in office, Iran hardened its morality laws, increased the number of executions, and carried out a bloody crackdown on the 2022 Jin, Jiyan, Azadi (Women, Life, Freedom) anti-government protests that erupted following the death of Amini, a Kurdish woman who was killed by Iranian morality police for wearing a lax hijab.
He was also sanctioned by the United States for involvement in the mass execution of political prisoners in the 1980s.
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