Helicopter carrying Iran’s president suffers ‘hard landing’
A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has suffered a “hard landing”, Iranian state media reported.
Some began urging the public to pray for Mr Raisi and the others on board as rescue crews sped through a misty, rural forest where his helicopter was believed to be.
Mr Raisi was travelling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province.
State TV said the incident happened near Jolfa, a city on the border with Azerbaijan, some 600 kilometres (375 miles) north-west of the Iranian capital Tehran.
Later, the TV put it farther east near the village of Uzi, but details remained contradictory.
Travelling with Mr Raisi were Iran’s foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, the governor of Iran’s East Azerbaijan province and other officials, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.
One local government official used the word “crash” to describe the incident, but he acknowledged to an Iranian newspaper that he had yet to reach the site himself.
Neither IRNA nor state TV offered any information on Mr Raisi’s condition.
However, hard-liners urged the public to pray for him.
State TV later aired images of the faithful praying at Imam Reza Shrine in the city of Mashhad, one of Shiite Islam’s holiest sites.
“The esteemed president and company were on their way back aboard some helicopters and one of the helicopters was forced to make a hard landing due to the bad weather and fog,” interior minister Ahmad Vahidi said in comments aired on state TV.
“Various rescue teams are on their way to the region but because of the poor weather and fogginess it might take time for them to reach the helicopter.”
He added: “The region is a bit (rugged) and it’s difficult to make contact. We are waiting for rescue teams to reach the landing site and give us more information.”
Rescuers were attempting to reach the site, state TV said, but had been hampered by poor weather conditions.
There had been heavy rain and fog reported with some wind.
IRNA called the area a “forest” and the region is known to be mountainous as well.
Mr Raisi had been on the border with Azerbaijan early on Sunday to inaugurate a dam with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev.
The dam is the third one that the two nations built on the Aras River.
The visit came despite chilly relations between the two nations, including over a gun attack on Azerbaijan’s embassy in Tehran in 2023, and Azerbaijan’s diplomatic relations with Israel, which Iran’s Shiite theocracy views as its main enemy in the region.
Iran flies a variety of helicopters in the country, but international sanctions make it difficult to obtain parts for them.
Its military air fleet also largely dates back to before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Mr Raisi, 63, is a hard-liner who formerly led the country’s judiciary.
He is viewed as a protege of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and some analysts have suggested he could replace the 85-year-old leader after his death or resignation from the role.
Mr Raisi won Iran’s 2021 presidential election, a vote that saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic Republic’s history.
Mr Raisi is sanctioned by the US in part over his involvement in the mass execution of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 at the end of the bloody Iran-Iraq war.
Under Mr Raisi, Iran now enriches uranium at nearly weapons-grade levels and hampers international inspections.
Iran has armed Russia in its war on Ukraine, as well as launched a massive drone-and-missile attack on Israel amid its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
It has also continued arming proxy groups in the Middle East, such as Yemen’s Houthi rebels and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
Published: by Radio NewsHub