Iran’s chief of staff forms committee to investigate the causes of the helicopter crash of the country’s president and foreign minister

Iranian authorities said Monday that President Ebrahim Raisi’s funeral will be held in Tehran on Wednesday after he was killed in a helicopter crash.

Vice President for Executive Affairs Mohsen Mansouri told state television that “a funeral procession will be held on Wednesday morning in Tehran” for Raisi and his companions killed in the helicopter crash, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

Iran on Monday declared five days of mourning for its president, Ebrahim Raisi, who was killed in a helicopter crash along with eight other people, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, three years after the hardline conservative president, once seen as one of the leading candidates to succeed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, came to power.

With Raisi’s death at the age of 63, a period of political instability begins in Iran as the war in the Gaza Strip intensifies between Israel and the Islamic Republic’s ally Hamas in the Middle East.

The chairman of Iran’s armed forces’ Joint Chiefs of Staff, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, on Monday ordered an investigation into the cause of the crash of the helicopter carrying the president and other officials.

Iran’s ISNA news agency reported that Bagheri had ordered a high-level committee to open an investigation into the cause of the crash of the president’s helicopter on Sunday.

Thousands gathered in central Tehran on Monday to honor the memory of Raisi and Abdollahian.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has appointed First Vice President Mohammad Mokhbir to assume the presidency.

Iran’s constitution stipulates that the first vice president will assume the duties of president in the event of death, and presidential elections will be held within 50 days after death.

“In compliance with Article 131 of the Constitution, the informant shall assume the presidency of the executive authority,” the Supreme Leader said in his first comments after Raisi’s death was officially announced, pointing out that he must, according to the laws in force, work with the heads of the legislative and judicial authorities to hold new presidential elections “within a maximum period of 50 days,” declaring five days of mourning in the country.

Ali Bagheri, the chief nuclear negotiator and deputy foreign minister for political affairs, was appointed acting foreign minister, succeeding Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

The Iranian government on Monday mourned President Ebrahim Raisi, (63), shortly after the helicopter he was in was found in an accident on Sunday in a mountainous region in the northwest.

The Iranian government said in a statement carried by the official IRNA news agency, “The great spirit of the servant of the Iranian people has risen to its righteousness, and the servant of Imam Reza Ayatollah Raisi has become the head of the people and a lover in heaven”.

The government also mourned other officials who were accompanying the president when the plane crashed in East Azerbaijan province, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian, Friday Imam in Tabriz Ayatollah Ali Al Hashim, and East Azerbaijani Governor Malik Rahmati.

The government assured the Iranian people that there will be not the slightest defect or problem in the jihadist management of the country.

Iran’s Red Crescent announced Monday morning that rescue teams had recovered the body of Raisi and eight others who were in the helicopter, adding that the bodies had been taken to Tabriz, the center of East Azerbaijan province.

Iranian television broadcast images of a number of members of the Iranian Red Crescent marching through thick fog in mountainous areas, using vehicles and four-wheel-drive vehicles advancing on narrow, muddy roads before reaching the helicopter.

The bodies were taken to Tabriz, Iran’s largest city in northwestern Iran, where funerals will begin on Tuesday, before being taken to Tehran to complete the ceremony.

Three helicopters were part of the return flight from the inauguration of a dam in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province shared with Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev participated in the opening.

The other two helicopters arrived safely in Tabriz, where the president was supposed to board a plane to return to Tehran.

According to Iranian media, 73 teams took part in the search for the helicopter, using trained dogs and drones.

Türkiye announced the dispatch of 32 rescue workers and six vehicles to participate in the search, and “an Akinci drone and a helicopter equipped with night vision technology Cougar”.

Hardline conservative Ebrahim Raisi has seized Iran’s executive power amid tense international relations and internal protests, and the long-running career in the Islamic Republic’s political system is known for his closeness to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Russian President Vladimir Putin praised Raisi as a “distinguished politician and a true friend” of Moscow, while Chinese President Xi Jinping said the death of the Iranian president was a “great loss for the Iranian people”.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed his “sincere condolences to the Iranian people, government, friends and brothers, especially to the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,” saying he stood “by our neighbor Iran”.

Gulf states, the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and Arab states on Monday expressed condolences on the death of Iranian President and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

Members of the UN Security Council on Monday observed a minute’s silence in memory of the late president.

Raisi called Iran-backed militias and groups in the Middle East.