Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi is involved in helicopter crash as frantic rescue missions is launched - just hours after posing for pictures with Azerbaijan's President Aliyev

Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi has been involved in a helicopter crash hours after posing for pictures with Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and rescuers are frantically trying to reach the site.

The aircraft was traveling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province when it suffered a ‘hard landing’, according to Iranian state television.

Rescuers were attempting to reach the site, but had been hampered by poor weather conditions in the area. There had been heavy rain reported with some wind.

The helicopter was one of a convoy of three and foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and Friday prayer Imam Seyyed Mohammad-Ali Al-Hashem were also reportedly on the helicopter with the president.

It comes after Iran launched a massive drone-and-missile attack on Israel amid its conflict in Gaza.

‘Some of the president’s companions on this helicopter were able to communicate with Central Headquarters, raising hopes that the incident could have ended without casualties,’ Iranian news agency Tasnim said.

‘Seyyed Mohammad-Ali Al-Hashem, Tabriz’s Friday Prayer Imam, and Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian were also reportedly on the helicopter with the president.’

There was no immediate elaboration on what happened to the helicopter or what led to the incident.

One local government official used the word “crash” to describe the incident, but he acknowledged to an Iranian newspaper that he had yet to reach the site himself. 

But there have not been any updates on Raisi’s condition. 

State TV said the incident happened near Jolfa, a city on the border with the nation of Azerbaijan, some 375 miles northwest of the Iranian capital, Tehran.

Iran flies a variety of helicopters in the country, but international sanctions make it difficult to obtain parts for them.

Its military air fleet also largely dates back to before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Raisi had been in Azerbaijan early Sunday to inaugurate a dam with Azerbaijan’s President Aliyev.

The dam is the third one that the two nations built on the Aras River.

The visit came despite chilly relations between the two nations, including over a gun attack on Azerbaijan’s Embassy in Tehran in 2023, and Azerbaijan’s diplomatic relations with Israel, which Iran’s Shiite theocracy views as its main enemy in the region.

Raisi, 63, is a hard-liner who formerly led the country’s judiciary. He is viewed as a protégé of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and some analysts have suggested he could replace the 85-year-old leader after his death or resignation from the role.

Raisi won Iran’s 2021 presidential election, a vote that saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic Republic’s history.

He is sanctioned by the U.S. in part over his involvement in the mass execution of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 at the end of the bloody Iran-Iraq war.

Under Raisi, Iran now enriches uranium at nearly weapons-grade levels and hampers international inspections.

Iran has armed Russia in its war on Ukraine and it also has continued arming proxy groups in the Mideast, like Yemen’s Houthi rebels and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.