ABU DHABI (REUTERS/DPA/ALETIHAD)
A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his foreign minister crashed on Sunday as it was crossing mountain terrain in heavy fog, while they were on their way back from a visit to the border with Azerbaijan in Iran’s northwest, leaving both the leaders dead.
“President Raisi’s helicopter was completely burned in the crash… unfortunately, all passengers are feared dead,” an official told news agency Reuters.
“With the discovery of the crash site, no signs of life have been detected among the helicopter’s passengers,” the head of Iran’s Red Crescent, Pirhossein Kolivand, earlier told the state TV.
Who was Ebrahim Raisi?
Raisi, who died aged 63, rose from prosecutor to president in 2021. He had received a PhD in Islamic jurisprudence and law.
Born in 1960 in Mashhad, in north-east Iran, Raisi won the presidential election in June 2021 with just under 62% of the vote as the leading candidate.
The election had a turnout of about 48.9% in the country of 83 million people.
Raisi succeeded Hassan Rouhani.
In 1980, Raisi was named prosecutor-general of Karaj in western Tehran, and served as Tehran’s prosecutor-general from 1989-1994.
In 2004, he was named deputy chief of the Judicial Authority before he was appointed by Khamenei to the high-profile job of judiciary chief in 2019.
Shortly afterwards, he was also elected deputy chairman of the Assembly of Experts, the 88-member clerical body responsible for electing the next Supreme Leader.
Raisi served as deputy head of the judiciary for 10 years before being appointed prosecutor-general in 2014.
Seeking the presidency, Raisi had lost to Rouhani in a 2017 election.