By Arsalan Shahra
Iranian state tv reported that there have been “no indicators of life” on the website the place a helicopter carrying President Ebrahim Raisi crashed within the nation’s northwest.
Click right here to attach with us on WhatsApp
Iranian emergency rescue groups first noticed the crash website, close to the village of Tabil in northwestern Iran, and reported seeing wreckage, in response to Iranian state media.
Thick fog within the area has sophisticated the search effort, state media stated.Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in an announcement broadcast on state tv, known as on Iranians to hope for Raisi’s well being and stated the incident “won’t trigger disruption to the nation’s affairs.”
Raisi, an ultra-conservative cleric in his 60s, gained Iran’s 2021 presidential election and is seen because the main candidate to ultimately succeed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The incident got here amid turmoil within the Middle East over the Gaza conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed Hamas, which is designated a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union. The incident has introduced Iran and Israel to the brink of all-out conflict and has led to different Iranian-backed teams, together with the Houthis in Yemen and Shiite militias in Iraq, attacking U.S. navy bases and industrial ships within the Red Sea.
The semi-official Tasnim information company reported that Raisi’s aircraft consisted of three helicopters and carried senior officers, together with Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdullahian, who was believed to have been aboard Raisi’s plane on the time.
A State Department spokesman stated the US was carefully monitoring studies in regards to the incident however declined to remark additional. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer stated Sunday that intelligence businesses had briefed him on the matter, discovering no proof of wrongdoing, NBC News reported.
“Extremely troublesome” searches
Nearly 10 hours into the search, darkness, heavy fog and rain have made it “extraordinarily troublesome,” Pirhossein Khlivand, head of Iran’s emergency medical companies, advised state tv. Iran’s Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi had earlier stated it may take time to seek out the president’s helicopter due to unhealthy climate.
Turkey’s nationwide catastrophe administration company, AFAD, stated Iran had requested a search and rescue helicopter with evening imaginative and prescient capabilities. Around 32 rescue and analysis personnel and 6 autos had additionally been dispatched to Iran, AFAD stated in a submit on X.
Turkey’s Defense Ministry stated it had despatched the Akinci drones in response to a request from Iran, and that its Cougar helicopters had been saved on alert for deployment relying on climate situations.
The European Union has launched a fast response mapping service in response to a request for assist from Iran, EU Crisis Management Commissioner Janez Lenarčić stated in a submit on X.
Iranian tv confirmed dwell footage of dozens of ambulances arriving in heavy rain and fog, and a journalist close to the rescue groups described the difficulties of reaching the crash website, given roads made impassable by mud and the remoteness of the world.
The broadcast additionally confirmed pilgrims praying for Raisi at a holy website in his hometown of Mashhad within the northeast.
According to Iranian media, Raisi’s helicopter was additionally believed to be carrying the governor of East Azerbaijan province and a consultant of the supreme chief within the metropolis of Tabriz.
Both Raisi and Amirabdullahian oversaw the restoration of diplomatic ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia via a China-brokered settlement introduced in March 2023. But that got here at a time when negotiations between Iran and world powers to revive the nuclear deal and carry financial sanctions had been stalled.
The incident occurred whereas Raisi was getting back from Iran’s East Azerbaijan province, the place he met along with his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev early on Sunday and inaugurated a dam that the 2 international locations are collectively constructing on the border.
Raisi’s presidency comes after eight years underneath the rule of President Hassan Rouhani, a relative average who was a central determine within the nuclear deal from which former President Donald Trump withdrew the United States in 2018.
The U.S. withdrawal from the nuclear deal has empowered Iranian hard-liners who’ve all the time been important of the pact. Raisi was sanctioned by the Trump administration in 2019 for his position in a lethal crackdown on protesters who alleged voter fraud a decade in the past.
Rights teams additionally accuse him of main the mass executions of hundreds of dissidents within the late Eighties. In 2018, London-based Amnesty International stated he presided over “loss of life committees” and known as on the United Nations to analyze him for crimes in opposition to humanity.
Raisi’s first vp is Mohammed Mokbel, who has represented Iran on a variety of current abroad journeys and, like many senior Iranian officers, is topic to U.S. sanctions.