– / AFP
A helicopter had an accident, within a convoy of three aircraft transporting the Iranian president. Searches are underway to find the aircraft near the crash area.
One of the helicopters making up a convoy of three aircraft carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raïssi had an accident, reports Reuters according to information from Iranian television. The fate of the Iranian president is not known at this stage.
This accident took place, according to the Tasnim agency, above East Azerbaijan, a region in north-west Iran. The semi-official Iranian news agency further states that the two other helicopters in the convoy, carrying other Iranian officials, landed safely.
According to the Islamic Republic News Agency, IRNA, this accident would have occurred during the landing of the helicopter in conditions made difficult by the weather and fog. IRNA currently specifies that President Raïssi was notably accompanied, in his helicopter, by the Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Hossein Amir Abdollahian, as well as the governor of the Iranian region of East Azerbaijan.
The president was going there for the inauguration of a dam on the border between Iran and Azerbaijan, an inauguration which took place in the company of the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliev.
Searches made difficult by the weather
A search was launched to find the helicopter but was made difficult by the “unfavorable weather conditions”including fog, Interior Minister Ahmed Vahidi said on state television.
The minister did not confirm whether President Raïssi was on board the aircraft, which was part of a convoy of three helicopters carrying the presidential delegation. “It may take time to reach the helicopter area”he added, while this place would be located in the forest of Dizmar, near the town of Varzaghan.
Shannon Stapleton / REUTERS
President of the Islamic Republic of Iran since 2021, Ayatollah Ebrahim Raïssi is a Shiite cleric who made a career in the judicial system and participated, after the Iranian revolution, in the repression of opponents of the new regime in power. Supported by conservative circles, he is expected to succeed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as head of state. The NGO Amnesty International accuses him of crimes against humanity; It is under his presidency that since 2022, large-scale demonstrations, sometimes severely repressed, have broken out in the country to protest following the death of Mahsa Amini.
More information to come…