Iran, funeral ceremony underway in Tabriz for Iranian president Raisi

In Tabriz, the capital of the province of Eastern Azerbaijan, the funeral ceremony is underway for Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who died on Sunday 19 May in the crash of the helicopter he was traveling in, and for the other victims of the accident. The actual funeral of the leader, as announced yesterday by the Vice President of the Republic Mohsen Mansouri, will be held on May 23 in Raisi’s hometown, Mashhad, in the north-east of the country.

The funeral ceremony

The funeral ceremony in Tabriz began with a procession through the streets of the city. Before the official start, rallies were held in various cities across the country in honor of the dead president. In Tehran, thousands of people, many of them with Raisi’s portrait in hand, gathered in Valiasr Square. After the funeral procession in Tabriz, the bodies of Raisi and the other victims will be transferred to the holy city of Qom, south of Tehran, and from there they will be taken to the capital. Ayatollah Khamenei will lead prayers at a farewell ceremony planned in Tehran this evening, before processions begin in the capital on Wednesday. From there the remains of the deceased president will be transferred on Thursday to the province of South Khorasan, in the east, and then to his hometown, Mashhad, where they will be buried in the evening. The place chosen for the funeral is the Imam Reza Mausoleum, one of the main Shiite shrines. The bodies of the other victims will also be buried on Thursday at their respective places of birth.

The crash

Raisi was traveling to Tabriz when his helicopter crashed in northwestern Iran. Raisi, 63, lost his life along with the other passengers on the plane: Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the president’s bodyguards, General Mehdi Mousavi, a member of the Ansar al-Mahdi base of the Revolutionary Guards, the pilot, co-pilot and flight engineer. The Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, proclaimed five days of mourning and appointed Vice President Mohammad Mokhber as interim president until the new elections, scheduled for June 28. The position of Foreign Minister will be occupied by Ali Bagheri, until now deputy minister and main negotiator of the Iranian nuclear program.

The investigations

The Iranian Armed Forces General Staff has meanwhile ordered an investigation into the causes of the accident. A tragic accident is the generally shared hypothesis in the country, with almost no one having raised the hypothesis of a conspiracy. The helicopter Raisi was traveling on disappeared from radar on Sunday afternoon as it flew over a mountain range near the north-west border, triggering a search operation with hundreds of men, assisted by drones. The first teams who reached the aircraft, also thanks to a Turkish drone that identified it, found a wreckage surrounded by debris. Many of the remains were charred, but the Iranian Red Crescent confirmed that they were Raisi and his entourage. According to initial reconstructions released by state media, the helicopter crashed into a mountain and was destroyed after the violent impact on the ground. As for the causes of the crash, it is currently known that the weather conditions during the flight were terrible, although the IRNA agency spoke of a “technical fault” with the helicopter. The vehicle was not of the latest generation (it was an American-made Bell 212, probably a legacy from the times of the Shah) and was part of a fleet suffering from a shortage of spare parts due to Western sanctions.

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Iran, messages of condolence from all over the political world for Raisi’s death

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