Iranian Helicopter Crash: President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian among heli victims on Sunday. The civilian Bell 212 helicopter, which was flying in the mountainous area of East Azerbaijan while observing heavy fog, collided with the surface and killed all on board.
Passengers of the plane also included other important officials, such as ayatollah Mohammad Ali Al-e Hashem, who was the imam for Friday prayers in Tabriz, and General Malek Rahmati, who was the governor of the Iranian province of East Azerbaijan. Other members of the dead squad included the commander of the president’s protection unit, Sardar Seyed Mehdi Mousavi.
Amir-Abdollahian was a career diplomat and a conservative who was known for his extreme anti-Israel stance and his cynicism towards the West by having close relationships with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. At the time, as foreign minister, he had undertaken a mission to bring Iran closer to its Arab neighbors, particularly Saudi Arabia.
The world has, therefore, been thrown into mourning by the Iranian nation as a result of this great loss of life occasioned by a very tragic event. Everyone in the country is now consumed with the question of who will become the new President of Iran and take the country through this crucial time when it has lost its most important political officeholders.
