Iran's Armed Forces General Staff: No Bullet Impact Found on Raisi's Helicopter

Simultaneously with the funeral of Ebrahim Raisi, the President of Iran in Mashhad, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Iran published its first report on the crash of the helicopter carrying him and his companions on Thursday, June 3. The report stated: "No signs of bullet impact or similar cases were observed in the remaining parts of the crashed helicopter." Ebrahim Raisi, the eighth President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, suffered an air accident on Sunday evening, May 30, while returning from the inauguration of the "Qiz Qalasi" dam in the Varzeqan region of East Azerbaijan province, resulting in his death along with seven others. The report from the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Iran noted: "The helicopter continued on the pre-planned route and did not deviate from the designated flight path, and about one and a half minutes before the crash, the pilot of the crashed helicopter communicated with two other helicopters in the flight group." The report added: "The crashed helicopter caught fire after colliding with terrain." The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Iran also mentioned: "Due to the complexity of the area, fog, and low temperatures, the search operation extended into the night and continued throughout the night, and at dawn on Tuesday (5 AM), with the help of Iranian drones, the exact location of the crash was identified, and ground forces conducted search operations at that point." Ebrahim Raisi's body was buried in Mashhad. While the first report from the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Iran has been published, officials of the Islamic Republic have presented conflicting reports about the incident from the early hours following the news of the helicopter crash involving Ebrahim Raisi and his companions. The reaction to these contradictory narratives has been so widespread that even some figures close to the government and domestic media have raised significant criticisms despite the security atmosphere and threats in this regard. In further developments, Ali Nikzad, a representative from Ardabil in the Islamic Consultative Assembly, stated in a video interview: "When I realized that the President's helicopter had gone off the radar, due to my previous experience in the Ministry of Roads and Urban Development, I understood what had happened, and I immediately went to Varzeqan and the crisis headquarters at the Sangan copper factory." He added: "One of the villagers, upon seeing me, told me that he witnessed the President's helicopter crash and recounted the incident, saying that he saw how the helicopter was shaking." Mr. Nikzad said: "When he described the shaking to me, I understood what had happened." These statements indicate that the officials of the Islamic Republic were aware of the crash of the helicopter carrying Ebrahim Raisi and his entourage in East Azerbaijan province but did not announce the news until the following day. In this context, two Tehran-based newspapers called for clarification regarding the "ambiguities" of this incident and an investigation into the possibility of a "foreign conspiracy" in this regard. The Ham-Mihan newspaper, in its editorial on June 3, stated that "on the first day of the helicopter crash, two very important and related issues were evident," noting that the first issue was "misleading and ambiguous information" and the second was the "incomprehensible statements" of the officials of the Islamic Republic, which "not only does not resolve ambiguities but adds to them." The Jomhouri Islami newspaper also mentioned in its June 3 issue: "The fact that out of three Iranian helicopters returning from the border area to Tabriz, only the helicopter carrying the President encountered this incident, while it can rule out the connection of the incident with weather factors, strengthens the possibility of a conspiracy." Ebrahim's body was buried on June 3, 2023, in the "Dar al-Islam courtyard of Imam Reza's shrine" in Mashhad. On the same day, the bodies of two other victims of the incident, namely Malek Rahmati, the governor of East Azerbaijan, and Mehdi Mousavi, the head of the President's protection team, were also transferred to Mashhad, and the funeral of these three took place along the "Imam Reza Boulevard" to the "Reza Shrine," the tomb of the eighth Imam of Shia Muslims, with the presence of thousands of people. On the same day, the burial ceremony of Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the former Foreign Minister of Iran, who also died in the crash of the same helicopter, was completed in Shahr-e-Rey, and he was buried in the Shah Abdol Azim shrine in southern Tehran. On the same day, another victim of this incident, Mohammad Ali Alhashem, the Friday prayer leader and representative of Ali Khamenei in East Azerbaijan province, was also buried in the "Wadi Rahmat" cemetery in Tabriz. Two other victims of the incident, namely Second Lieutenant Pilot Mohsen Daryanoush in Najafabad and Second Lieutenant Pilot Taher Mostafavi, were also buried in Behesht Zahra in Tehran. The body of Captain Behrouz Ghadimi, the flight engineer and another victim of this incident, is expected to be buried in the village of Dersajin Abhar in Zanjan province, where he was born. The uncle and aunt of Pouya Bakhtiari, one of the victims of the November 2019 protests, have announced that Behrouz Ghadimi was their cousin.