Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi confirmed dead in helicopter crash after charred wreckage found
Bad weather is believed to have been a factor in the crash of the helicopter, which was travelling back from Azerbaijan in a convoy of three aircraft.
Monday 20 May 2024
Rescuers found the burned remains of the aircraft on Monday morning after he had been missing for more than 12 hours.
"President Raisi, the foreign minister and all the passengers in the helicopter were killed in the crash," a senior Iranian official told Reuters, asking not to be named.
Iran's Mehr news agency reported "all passengers of the helicopter carrying the Iranian president and foreign minister were martyred".
State TV said it had smashed into a mountain, although there was no official word on the cause of the crash.
"President Raisi's helicopter was completely burned in the crash... unfortunately, all passengers are feared dead," an official told Reuters.
Drone footage appeared to show the tail of the helicopter and scattered debris.
The search involving civilian and military teams had been hampered by thick fog and the remote location.
Iranian news agency IRNA said the president was flying in an American-made Bell 212 helicopter.
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Mr Raisi, 63, who was seen as a frontrunner to succeed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as Iran's supreme leader, was travelling back from Azerbaijan where he had opened a dam with the country's president.
Iran's foreign minister, Hossein Amirabdollahian, also died in the crash.
The governor of East Azerbaijan province and other officials and bodyguards were also believed to be on board when the helicopter crashed on Sunday.
Iranian media initially described it as a "hard landing".
The president's helicopter was travelling in a convoy of three aircraft.India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among the first world leaders to react to the news of Mr Raisi's death.
"India stands with Iran in this time of sorrow," he said in a post on X.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani expressed "great sadness and great sorrow" in a statement.
Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, posting on X, offered "deepest condolences and sympathies to the Iranian nation on this terrible loss".
President Raisi was elected in 2021 in a vote that had the lowest turnout in the Islamic republic's history.
The president was sanctioned by the US over the mass execution of political prisoners at the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1988.
His time in charge included major protests over Mahsa Amini - the woman who died after she was arrested for allegedly not wearing her hijab properly.
Iran also took the unprecedented decision in April to launch a drone and missile attack on Israel.
