Iran’s president is still missing after what is thought to have been a chopper crash in a darkish, hilly space.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, the country’s overseas minister, and different dignitaries have been aboard a helicopter that reportedly crashed in the rustic’s mountainous northwest on Sunday. The folk was once exhorted to pray as a huge rescue try started in a foggy woodland.

After the helicopter maximum for sure crashed greater than 12 hours in the past, Raisi and the opposite passengers have been still missing when the solar rose on Monday. Turkish drone video signifies the chopper crashed in the highlands. Rescuers raced to the scene.

As well as to enriching uranium nearer than ever to weapons-grade ranges, Iran below Raisi and Excellent Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei carried out an remarkable drone-and-missile strike on Israel remaining month.

The location is much more refined for Tehran and the way forward for the country because the Israel-Hamas battle inflames the wider Heart East since Iran has already continued years of enormous demonstrations in opposition to its Shiite theocracy over an in poor health financial system and girls’s rights.

Touring in the province of East Azerbaijan in Iran was once Raisi. State TV mentioned that what it described as a “onerous touchdown” happened shut to Jolfa, a town at the border with Azerbaijan, some 600 kilometers (375 miles) northwest of Tehran, the Iranian capital. Main points remained ambiguous, even supposing state TV later moved it additional east, shut to the agreement of Uzi.

Early on Monday morning, Turkish police made public what they known as drone video taking pictures what gave the impression to be a wildfire that they “suspected to be wreckage of helicopter.” About 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of the Azerbaijan-Iranian border, at the fringe of a prime mountain, are the places observed in the video.

The populace was once requested via hardliners to pray for him. Masses of religious other people have been observed on State TV praying on the Imam Reza Shrine in Mashhad, some of the holiest puts of Shiite Islam, in addition to in Qom and different portions of the country, some with their fingers unfold in pleading. The principle channel of state TV broadcast the prayers continuously.

A gaggle of men in Tehran watched a video of Raisi praying whilst kneeling at the aspect of the road, a few of them obviously crying as they held strands of prayer beads.

We’d be devastated if anything else occurs to him, some of the guys, Mehdi Seyedi, added. “Would possibly he go back to the hands of the country secure and sound and might the prayers paintings.”

“The esteemed president and corporate have been on their long ago aboard some helicopters and some of the helicopters was once pressured to make a onerous touchdown due to the dangerous climate and fog,” Inner Minister Ahmad Vahidi mentioned in remarks broadcast on state TV.

“A lot of rescue groups are headed for the realm, however given the dangerous climate and fog, it will take them a while to get to the helicopter.”

IRNA referred to the positioning as a “woodland,” and it is recurrently identified to be hilly. Photographs of SUVs rushing via a forested area have been proven on State TV, along side the rationale that dangerous climate—heavy rain and wind—was once impeding their development. There have been rescuers observed mountaineering during the mist and fog.

“We’re experiencing tough and complex stipulations” in the quest, mentioned Iranian govt spokesperson Ali Bahadori Jahromi lengthy after the solar set.

There is ‘no’ new information by any means until now, taking into account the coordinates of the incident web site and the elements stipulations, but it surely is the suitable of the folks and the media to take note of the newest information in regards to the president’s helicopter coincidence,” he mentioned at the social networking web site X. “The way in which forward in those instances is persistence, prayer, and religion in aid organizations.”

Khamenei for my part exhorted other people to pray as smartly.

Getting a “amen” from the worshippers he was once addressing, Khamenei remarked, “We are hoping that God the Almighty returns the precious president and his colleagues in complete well being to the hands of the country.”

The ideal chief did, alternatively, additionally emphasize that the federal government of Iran will cross on with its industry as standard. The Iranian charter supplies that if the president passes away with Khamenei’s approval, the vice president assumes place of job and a new presidential election is scheduled for inside 50 days. State media mentioned that whilst Raisi was once away, First Vice President Mohammad Mokhber had already began getting calls from officers and different countries.

Considered as a protégé of Khamenei, 63-year-old Raisi was once previously the top of the country’s court docket. Some observers have speculated that Raisi might prevail the 85-year-old chief upon his dying or retirement.

To open a dam with President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan, Raisi had been at the border with that nation early on Sunday. This dam is the 3rd person who the 2 nations built at the Aras River. In spite of strained ties between the 2 nations—which come with a gun try on Azerbaijan’s Embassy in Tehran in 2023 and Azerbaijan’s diplomatic ties with Israel, which Iran’s Shiite theocracy sees as its number one adversary in the area—the seek advice from happened.

Iran has a vary of helicopters, however portions for them are onerous to get via as a result of global sanctions. Its army aviation pressure is likewise most commonly from prior to the Islamic Revolution in 1979. With a blue-and-white paint scheme up to now observed in revealed footage, IRNA launched photos it characterised as Raisi setting out in what appeared like a Bell helicopter.

In the slightest degree-voted presidential election in the historical past of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Raisi prevailed. America sanctions Raisi in section for his function in the 1988 mass execution of 1000’s of political detainees on the conclusion of the brutal Iran-Iraq Warfare.

Iran lately enriches uranium to ranges nearly similar to guns grade below Raisi and obstructs outdoor inspections. Along side launching a large drone-and-missile strike on Israel all over its battle in opposition to Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Iran has armed Russia in its battle with Ukraine. Moreover, it has been supplying guns to Mideast proxy organizations together with as Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

For the time being, the country has been engulfed in years of huge demonstrations. The newest involved the dying of Mahsa Amini in 2022. She had been arrested up to now for reportedly no longer donning a scarf, or hijab, to the delight of the police. All through the months-long safety crackdown that adopted the protests, just about 22,000 other people have been arrested and over 500 folks misplaced their lives.

Iran was once deemed to be the supply of the “bodily violence” that killed Amini via a United Countries investigating panel in March.

Despite the fact that aides knowledgeable President Joe Biden at the Iran crisis, a senior management supply who spoke on anonymity and was once no longer allowed to speak about publicly claimed that management officers had no longer discovered a lot more than what is being revealed publicly via Iran state media.