Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi to be Buried in Mashhad Following Helicopter Crash

Tehran, May 21: Iranian Vice-President for Executive Affairs, Mohsen Mansouri, announced that the body of President Ebrahim Raisi will be buried on Thursday in the northeastern city of Mashhad. This follows the tragic helicopter crash in East Azerbaijan province on Sunday that claimed the lives of Raisi and his accompanying team.

Mansouri elaborated on the planned mourning ceremonies during remarks on Monday, as reported by the Iranian Students’ News Agency. Due to widespread requests from citizens wishing to attend the ceremonies, the Iranian Education Ministry has cancelled all student exams from Tuesday to Friday and declared a nationwide closure for Wednesday to facilitate the mourning events.

Funeral ceremonies will be held for Raisi in several cities, including Tabriz, Qom, Tehran, Birjand, and Mashhad from Tuesday to Thursday. President Raisi’s body will be interred at the holy shrine of Imam Reza in Mashhad on Thursday night.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has declared five days of national mourning in response to the incident. On Monday afternoon, a significant number of people gathered in Tehran to mourn the deaths of President Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Governor of East Azerbaijan Province Malek Rahmati, and Mohammad Ali Ale-Hashem, the supreme leader’s representative to East Azerbaijan.

The crash occurred on Sunday in Varzaqan County. President Raisi and his team were traveling from Khoda Afarin County, where Raisi had attended the inauguration ceremony of a storage dam with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, to the provincial capital Tabriz. All members aboard Raisi’s helicopter perished in the crash.